title: Reducing caesarean section rates--no easy task.
abstract: To identify the greatest potential for reducing overall caesarean delivery rates, we used longitudinally linked data for women with consecutive births 2001-2009 to examine the likely impact of hypothetical risk-based scenarios. Among women with a first birth, singleton, vertex-presenting fetus at term, increasing the vaginal birth rate following induction of labour by 20% potentially has greatest impact, with a 12.1% relative decrease in the overall caesarean rate. The potential relative decrease in other scenarios ranged from 0.8 to 5.9%.
authors.affiliation: Clinical and Population Perinatal Health Research, Kolling Institute of Medical Research, University of Sydney, St Leonards, New South Wales, Australia. clroberts@med.usyd.edu.au
authors.forename: Christine L
authors.initials: CL
authors.lastname: Roberts
authors.forename: Charles S
authors.initials: CS
authors.lastname: Algert
authors.forename: Angela L
authors.initials: AL
authors.lastname: Todd
authors.forename: Jonathan M
authors.initials: JM
authors.lastname: Morris
mesh_terms: D002585:Cesarean Section / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007751:Labor, Induced; D009517:New South Wales; D010298:Parity; D011247:Pregnancy; D016064:Vaginal Birth after Cesarean / Q000706:statistics & numerical data