Empower Families.
Improve Birth Outcomes.
Learn more about why the Greater Lafayette Area needs Allium Birth & Family Center.
Lafayette Needs Midwives
Greater Lafayette is in need of a dedicated birth center to provide better care for expecting families. Indiana consistently ranks poorly in maternal and infant health outcomes, and access to comprehensive, holistic birthing options are limited. Allium Birth & Family Center can address these challenges, offering midwifery care, personalized postpartum support, and eliminating the need for families to travel to Indianapolis to birth.
Financing Birth
Birth is a loss leader for hospitals, meaning the income generated doesn't cover costs. This has lead to maternity units across the state closing and those left reducing birthing options. A birth center offers high-quality, lower-cost care while providing a welcoming environment for all families.
How Can We Help
At Allium Birth & Family Center, we are committed to providing a range of services to support the physical, emotional, and mental well-being of expectant families and new parents. Our dedicated team is here to help you navigate the journey of parenthood with confidence and support.
Personalized Care
A birth center offers a more tailored approach to pregnancy and birth, with longer prenatal and postpartum appointments and more face time with health care provider during birth. Families are empowered to be the decision makers in their care.
Accessibility
Families in and around the Greater Lafayette area seeking a supportive birth experience without opting for a home birth are currently traveling an hour or more to Indianapolis for care. Allium Birth & Family Center would eliminate that travel burden for most families, providing a local option that offers holistic, high-quality care.
Cost-Effective Model
Studies have shown that birth centers and midwife-led care results in fewer cesarean sections and other costly interventions. With a focus on physiologic birth, birth centers provide shorter stays and fewer complications, which translates into lower overall costs. They help alleviate financial strain on the healthcare system while improving birth outcomes.
Increased Maternal Choice
A birth center provides women with more choices and autonomy over their birthing experience, offering options that are not available at Lafayette hospitals. These include water birth, intermittent handheld Doppler monitoring, midwife-attended births, and a more personalized and collaborative approach to care. This allows families to have greater control over how their birth unfolds, in a supportive and holistic environment.
Reduced Hosptial Pressure
Offering birth center care can reduce the load on hospital maternity wards by allowing midwives to manage low-risk births, while hospitals and obstetricians focus on high-risk cases. This model of maternity care, where midwives handle routine births and medical professionals intervene only when necessary, is the standard in most other developed countries. It leads to better resource allocation, improved outcomes, and more efficient use of healthcare services.
Building Community
Birth centers emphasize continuity of care, offering a seamless experience from pregnancy through postpartum. By providing a full spectrum of services, including prenatal education, childbirth classes, lactation support, and mental health resources, within a single location, birth centers create a supportive environment where families feel confident throughout their journey. Group classes and support groups continue to build a sense of community among parents nurturing long-term well-being for families.
Expert Recommendations
Major organizations and government panels are emphasizing the importance of increasing access to birth centers and midwifery care. Research consistently demonstrates that expanding these options can significantly enhance birth outcomes in the United States. By promoting midwifery and birth centers, we can address existing disparities in maternal and infant health, reduce unnecessary interventions, and empower families to make informed choices about their care.
March of Dimes
White House - Maternal Health Blueprint
"March of Dimes supports efforts to expand access to midwifery care and further integrate midwives and their model of care into maternity care in all states. This can help improve access to maternity care in under-resourced areas, reduce interventions that contribute to risk of maternal mortality and morbidity in initial and subsequent pregnancies, lower costs, and potentially improve the health of mothers and babies."
Strong Start for Mothers and Newborns Initiative
"Expand access to freestanding birth centers, licensed midwives, and doulas. HHS will continue to work with states to expand coverage of these services wherever possible—including further education on doulas, freestanding birth centers, and their impact on outcomes. HHS released guidance for states on best practices to expand access to community-based childbirth care and freestanding birth centers as well as guidance for midwifery-based models of care and how doulas can be used to provide birthing support in disproportionately impacted communities."
"The 5‐year evaluation report suggests that midwifery‐led birth centers are an important solution to the current maternal‐child health crisis in the United States. Evaluators demonstrated that midwifery‐led birth
centers produced optimal outcomes and reduced health disparities."
ACOG
"American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists recognizes accredited birth centers as an integral part of regionalized care."
Center for Medicare & Medicaid Services
"Birth centers have also proven to be an effective, safe, and lower-cost model to perinatal care than hospital deliveries for low-risk pregnancies. An integrated literature review published in 2016 found that deliveries occurring at a birth center had lower rates of assisted vaginal births and cesarean section births than hospitals."