{"id":629071,"date":"2026-08-09T20:07:10","date_gmt":"2026-08-09T20:07:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/629071\/"},"modified":"2026-08-09T20:07:10","modified_gmt":"2026-08-09T20:07:10","slug":"hse-issues-irelands-first-ever-guidance-on-birthing-pools-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/629071\/","title":{"rendered":"HSE issues Ireland\u2019s first-ever guidance on birthing pools \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ireland\u2019s first national clinical practice guideline on the use of birthing pools for labour and births has been issued by the Health Service Executive.<\/p>\n

The guidance for midwives and healthcare workers aims to develop a consistent approach to the use of birthing pools in all maternity settings, including hospitals<\/a> and home births.<\/p>\n

Developed by the HSE<\/a>\u2019s National Women and Infants Health Programme, the guideline, extending to 100 pages, is approved by the Institute of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists.<\/p>\n

It offers evidence-based standards for the care of women using a birthing pool during labour and\/or birth, setting out eligibility criteria and specific requirements for water depth, temperature and maternal hydration.<\/p>\n

The guideline is focused on supporting informed choice for pregnant women, but for now only healthy women with low-risk pregnancies are eligible for water labour and birth. <\/p>\n

The eligibility criteria may be expanded at a later stage to enable women with risk factors to safely labour in water and\/or have a water birth.<\/p>\n

Of Ireland\u2019s 19 maternity units, 12 have birthing pools. However, not all of those currently facilitate water delivery. <\/p>\n

Data from the Central Statistics Office<\/a> shows 292 home or non-hospital births were recorded in 2023, but there are no precise figures for water delivery.<\/p>\n

The HSE says that about half of women who opt for a home birth will labour in water, with around half of those going on to have a water birth.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ireland\u2019s first national clinical practice guideline on the use of birthing pools for labour and births has been…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":629072,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[78],"tags":[1412,18,135,2450,7005,60,19,17],"class_list":["post-629071","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health","tag-central-statistics-office","tag-eire","tag-health","tag-health-service-executive-hse","tag-hospitals","tag-hse","tag-ie","tag-ireland"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/117067359596904670","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/629071","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=629071"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/629071\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/629072"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=629071"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=629071"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=629071"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}