Senate passes bill giving pregnant women more birthing options. Pregnant women in Kentucky may soon have another option when it comes to labor and delivery: free-standing birthing centers. Northern ...

Hospital labor and delivery units are shuttering across the nation — including more than two dozen in 2025 alone. Freestanding birth centers like Skanes' could help fill the gaps, but they too are ...

The steady rise in C-sections from 21 percent of births in 1996 to 32 percent today is a major quality and cost problem. The trend has been associated with a significant increase in serious maternal ...

The Connecticut Childbirth & Women’s Center, the only free-standing birthing center in the state since 1997, recently changed hands as national trends show that these types of facilities are growing ...

Dr. Heather Skanes opened Alabama’s first freestanding birth center in 2022 in her hometown of Birmingham. Skanes, an OB-GYN, wanted to improve access to maternal health care in a state that’s long ...