09/01/2025
We are excited to share the publication of the first-ever national consensus guidelines for intermittent auscultation (IA) in home and birth center settings, recently published in Birth: Issues in Perinatal Care!
IA is the gold standard for fetal assessment in low-risk pregnancies and is used by midwives at home births and birth centers. But until now, there’s never been a unified national standard — something that has caused variation in practice and confusion in education, quality improvement, and informed choice.
These guidelines are the result of a 21-month consensus process involving midwives, educators, and quality experts from across the country. Together, they created a framework to support safe, consistent, evidence-based care for birthing families.
Big thanks to the co-authors — Silke Akerson, Sarah Bradbury, Rosanna Davis, Amy Romano, Wendy Gordon, and Holly Scholles — and grateful to all the national organizations who helped shape and review this work: American Association of Birth Centers, American College of Nurse-Midwives, National Association of Certified Professional Midwives (NACPM), AWHONN - The Association of Women's Health, Obstetric and Neonatal Nurses, and Commission for the Accreditation of Birth Centers.
Thanks to funding from the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, the full article is available open access here - https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/birt.70002.
