Few experiences in life are as exciting as bringing home a new member of your family. Central Maine Healthcare wants to help you get ready for birth and caring for your newborn in any way that we can.
Ways We Can Help
Our doctors, midwives, and nurses are here to help you create the best plan for your upcoming birth experience. There are several ways we can assist in your preparation, including:
- Childbirth and Parenting Classes: We offer a selection of classes for families, including childbirth education.
- Guide to Pregnancy and Birth: We want to make sure you have the best birth experience, so we’ve created guides to help inform you and answer all your questions. From pregnancy to birth, breastfeeding to new mother and baby care, we’ve covered it all in our helpful guides created just for you.
- Car Seat: Proper installation of your new baby’s car seat is vital to its working properly to keep your newborn safe. We can ease your mind by helping you ensure that it’s installed correctly.
Personalized Birth Plan: At Central Maine Healthcare, our goal is to help you have the best birth experience possible. To help you and your doctor better understand your birth preferences, we encourage parents-to-be to create a birth plan. Central Maine Healthcare can provide you with a birth plan form through your care provider.
What is a Birth Plan? A birth plan is a personal care plan that outlines your preferences for how you’d like your labor, birth, and postpartum care to go. By creating a plan, you can determine exactly what kind of care you would like for you and your baby.
We encourage you and your spouse or birthing partner to enroll in our childbirth education classes, where you can learn about options that will be available to you during the labor experience. This will help you decide what should go into your birth plan and if your expectations are in sync with any requirements your hospital and birthing unit may have.
Creating Your Birth Plan: To create your plan, we suggest starting by making some notes about your labor and birth preferences. You can address experiences such as:
- The sort of emotional support you would like to have. (For example, who would you like to be with you?)
- The special comforts you would like to have throughout labor. (For example, would you like to spend time in a labor tub?)
- The ways that you would like to alternative therapies. (For example, would you be interested in trying out our birthing stools and physical therapy balls?)
Be sure to share your birth plan with your healthcare provider and other maternity support people, as they might have some great ideas for you. Also show it to those who will be with you during your labor and birth experience. You can go over your plan with the team ahead of time, so they know what your preferences are.
Keep in mind that if your birth does not go exactly as you planned, it’s okay! This is where flexibility is the key. Learn about the ways that labor can unfold and plan for how you will handle unexpected situations, then focus on the positive.
A birth plan reflects how you would like to navigate a joyful experience. By writing things down, you also let those assisting you know more about who you are.
Guide to Pregnancy and Birth
We know that new parents often have lots of questions about pregnancy, delivery, and taking care of a new infant. That’s why Central Maine Healthcare created guides to guide you on your new parenting path. To make it even more interactive and accessible, this series of guides includes online access to educational videos. That way you can read the material and then see the information in action. If you’ve already received access to your guides, you can get to the online materials by signing in here.
Guides for Pregnancy through Parenting: We created the Injoy Birth & Parenting Education series to address many of the common questions that new parents often have. Included in this series are four guides:
- Understanding Pregnancy
- Better Breastfeeding
- Understanding Birth (for those who are enrolled in our Childbirth Education Course)
- Mother and New Baby Care
Baby’s Car Seat
When it’s time to head home after the birth, it is important to make sure your baby is safe and snug in their car seat. At CMH, your safety is one of our top priorities which includes the ride home! For more information about car seat inspection and installations, call 207-795-2695.
Keep Your Baby Safe: Maine law requires that your baby rides home in an approved child safety seat. It’s best to take the time to install the car seat ahead of time, so you’ll be familiar with how it works before your baby is born. We recommend that you have the car seat inspected by a certified car seat inspection station, just to make sure it’s as safe as can be.
Central Maine Healthcare helps with safe care seat installations by providing resources. We can connect you with the professionals that can test your installation.
Why CMH Created the Program: Child safety seats are required under Maine law. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration statistics show that using properly installed car seats reduces the risk of death by 71 percent for infants and by 54 percent for children between one and four years of age. Child car seats also reduce the need for hospitalization after a car accident. Simply put: car seats save children’s lives.
Virtual Car Seat Assistance: CMMC offers free virtual car seat inspections and installation assistance. Appointments available daily.
Contact: June Turcotte, Certified Child Passenger Safety Technician 207-795-2695
Need more resources? Child Passenger Safety Seat Program
Community Resources: You can bring your vehicle and car seat to a free monthly fitting clinic held at the United Ambulance station in Lewiston on the third Thursday of every month from 2 p.m. – 6 p.m. More information about car seat safety (as well as inspection dates and locations) is available through the Maine Department of Motor Vehicles or the Safe Kids Maine organization.
To help you get started with proper car seat installation procedure, we’ve included some tips below.
- The safest way to position the harness: the internal harness straps should be at or below your baby’s shoulders when using a car seat in the rear-facing position.
- Once you have buckled your baby into the internal harness, adjust the harness so the fit is snug. If you can pinch a fold in the harness, it is not tight enough and will need to be re-adjusted. The harness retainer clip is in the proper position when it is at armpit level.
- It is not recommended to add items to your safety seat that did not come with it. If you feel that your baby needs additional head support, you can use rolled baby blankets or towels and place them on each side. Do not place anything including blankets behind the baby or between the baby and the harness.
- To obtain optimal harness fit for your baby it’s ideal to avoid bulky clothing. Once the baby is secured in the harness cover the child with a blanket if needed.