For a child in a breech presentation, a Cesarean section is safer than normal vaginal delivery.
One out of 80 children born vaginally in a breech presentation dies or has serious problems after birth; this number is only 1 out of approximately 600 when a Cesarean section is performed. However, the mother is more at risk.
This emerged from the doctoral research done by Christine Rietberg. For some time now there has been an ongoing debate on optimal obstetric policy for breech presentations, especially since a major international study in 2000 showed that Cesareans are safer than vaginal birth. To prove the safety of Cesareans, Rietberg analyzed all full-term breech deliveries between 1995 and 2004, a total of 45,000 breech births.
Rietberg will receive her PhD from Utrecht University on October 31. The title of her thesis is, “Term breech delivery in The Netherlands.”