A two-day conference on “Better Birth Experience” organized in Hyderabad. | Photo credit: Special arrangement
Hydrotherapy and water births became central themes at a two-day “Better Birth Experience” conference held in Hyderabad, where doctors and midwifery experts called for a move away from India’s interventional practices of difficult births. The event, which began on Saturday, highlighted that non-pharmaceutical techniques such as warm water births, bath births and allowing women to move freely during labor can reduce fear, pain and unnecessary medical procedures.
Experts noted that while the benefits of water births are widely recognized around the world, the practice is still rare in India. Dr. Evita Fernandez, president of the Fernandez Foundation, said the country sees nearly 25 million births each year, but hydrotherapy accounts for less than 0.01% of them. She attributed this to a lack of trained midwives, a huge patient load in public hospitals and the lack of infrastructure needed to keep birthing pools clean and safe.
Experts pointed out that hydrotherapy is far from a new concept. Inderjeet Kaur, director of obstetrics at the hospital, said rituals involving water births were traced to areas around the Red Sea in Egypt, while the first documented water birth took place in France in 1803. The UK began offering the option routinely in the 1970s and 1980s. It was introduced by Fernandez Hospital in India in 2017 and has since enabled more than 800 hydrotherapy treatments and more than 430 water births.
Dr. Pallavi Chandra, organizing secretary of the conference, said childbirth as a natural process has remained the same for millions of years, but hospitals have reshaped the birthing environment to suit clinical comfort. Over the past six to seven decades, she says, birth has gradually morphed into a clinical event focused on monitoring, speed and efficiency, often at the expense of woman-centered birth.
Published – 8 Nov 2025 20:10 IST
