Evidence Based Care, Castor Oil and More

Adriana talks with Rebecca Dekker about evidence-based care, how it relates to Florence Nightingale, why it matters and how to bring its three components into your maternity care. We also talk about the evidence for using castor oil as an induction method and much more. Check it out.

What we talked about:

• Her new book
• “This is just the way we do it” and clinicians who lie to patients and themselves
• Rebecca reads an insightful excerpt from her book
• Where does evidence based medicine come from?
• The standards of evidence based care
• The importance of shared decision making
• Pressures on clinicians
• Putting evidence based care to work: Rebecca’s experience at going past 42 weeks
• The evidence for using castor oil as an induction method
• How does it work?
• How to get past the nasty taste?
• Working in a medical setting: power systems, social psychology, values and trauma
• The BRAIN acronym

Related resources*:

• EvidenceBasedBirth.com
• Bias In Medicine, Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (video)
• Natural Labor Induction Series: Castor Oil, from Evidence Based Birth
• Babies Are Not Pizzas: They’re born, not delivered! book by Rebecca Dekker
• EBB’s Natural Labor Induction Series
• BRAIN acronym

Related Birthful episodes:

• Big Babies and Shoulder Dystocia, with Rachel Reed
• The Problem with Due Dates, with Gail Hart
• The Induction Process, with Toni Golen
• Updated: Evidence & Eating During Labor, with Rebecca Dekker

Courtesy of Rebecca Deller

About Rebecca Dekker

Rebecca Dekker, PhD, RN, is the founder and CEO of Evidence Based Birth®. After earning her Bachelor’s, Master’s, and PhD in Nursing, Rebecca embarked on a career as a nurse scientist and professor. In 2016, she left academia to become a full-time entrepreneur and consumer advocate for evidence based care. Her mission is to raise the quality of childbirth care globally, by putting accurate, evidence based research into the hands of families and communities, so they can make informed, empowered choices. Rebecca lives in Lexington, Kentucky, where she and her husband Dan are raising three children and an assortment of pets. Babies Are Not Pizzas is her first book.

Learn more at EvidenceBasedBirth.com or join the conversation on Facebook or Instagram.