My name is Susan Rouser and I am a Certified Labor Doula through the Childbirth And Postpartum Professionals Association (CAPPA). If you are pregnant, Congratulations! I would love to help you acheive the best birth possible. As a labor Doula I will strive to provide you physical, emotional and informational support throughout your pregnancy and labor.  Weather you are having a hospital birth, birth center birth, or a homebirth I can help! 

What is a Doula?

The word Doula is a Greek word translated to mean "woman's servant".   It has come to refer to professional labor and/or postpartum support for the birthing family.  This role is nothing new.  For thousands of years, when a woman went into labor, other women in her community were expected to come to her home and help.  As our socitey moved birthing women out of the home and into the hospitals more and more women have distanced themselves from this wise tradition.  While the idea of mothering the mother is not new;  the statistical evidence supporting Doulas is.
From the Book Mothering the Mother: How a Doula Can Help You Have a Shorter, Easier, and Healthier Birth by Klaus, Klaus, and Kennell, have a doula results in:

• a fifty percent reduction in caesarean rates

• a twenty-five percent reduction in average length of labor

• a sixty percent reduction in requests for an epidural

• a forty percent reduction in the use of oxytocin(Pitocin) to induce labor

• a thirty percent reduction in analgesia use

• a forty percent reduction in forceps deliveries