Pregnancy and birth are deeply personal experiences. For many healthy, low risk pregnant people, a birth center offers an opportunity to receive skilled, attentive maternity care in a setting that feels calm, welcoming, and centered on the family.
At Haven Midwifery Collective, we believe every birthing person deserves respectful care, clear information, and meaningful choices. Our future birth center will be designed to offer a safe, loving, community based space for pregnancy, birth, and the early postpartum period.
What Is a Birth Center?
A birth center is an out of hospital setting for people with healthy, low risk pregnancies who are expecting an uncomplicated birth. Birth centers are not hospitals, but they are professional healthcare settings led by qualified midwives and designed to support physiologic birth, the natural process of labor and birth with limited routine medical intervention.
Unlike a hospital labor and delivery unit, a birth center is designed to feel more like home. It is a place where birthing people can move freely, eat and drink as appropriate, use comfort measures, invite chosen support people, and labor in positions that feel right for their bodies.
Birth centers recognize that birth is not only a medical event. It is also a family and community experience. The goal is to provide skilled care while protecting the dignity, autonomy, comfort, and preferences of each person giving birth.
Who Is Birth Center Care For?
Birth center care is intended for people whose pregnancies remain low risk and who are likely to have an uncomplicated vaginal birth. Throughout pregnancy, midwives assess each client’s health, answer questions, and help determine whether birth center care continues to be the right fit.
Not every pregnancy is appropriate for out of hospital birth, and that is why ongoing assessment, communication, and collaboration are essential. When a higher level of medical care is needed, transfer to a hospital is a normal part of a safe, integrated maternity care system, not a failure.
What Makes Birth Center Care Different?
Birth centers offer a model of care that is relationship based, individualized, and family centered. Rather than treating everyone’s labor the same way, midwives support each person’s unique needs, preferences, culture, and goals.
At a birth center, care often includes:
- More time for questions, education, and shared decision making
- A focus on healthy pregnancy and physiologic birth
- Freedom to move, change positions, rest, eat, and use comfort measures during labor
- Continuous emotional and physical support during birth
- Space for partners, family members, and other chosen support people
- Support for early bonding, skin to skin contact, and feeding after birth
- Personalized postpartum guidance for the birthing person and newborn
Midwifery led care centers the belief that pregnant people are the experts on their own bodies and families. Midwives bring clinical expertise, careful assessment, and compassionate support to help families make informed decisions throughout pregnancy, birth, and beyond.
What Will Haven Midwifery Offer?
Haven Midwifery Collective is working to create a future birth center for New York City rooted in safety, dignity, love, and community. Haven will provide safe, quality, loving care through pregnancy, birth, and beyond.
Our certified midwives will be devoted to accompanying and supporting pregnant people through each stage of pregnancy as they prepare to welcome a new child into the world.
Haven’s future birth center will offer:
- A safe, comfortable, out of hospital setting for healthy people at low risk for complications
- Midwifery led care during pregnancy, labor, birth, and the postpartum period
- Individualized education and support to help families prepare for birth and early parenting
- A home like environment that supports movement, comfort, privacy, and family connection
- Care that honors each person’s values, culture, identity, and birth preferences
- A model of care that supports informed choice and shared decision making
- Connection to community resources and a broader vision for maternal wellness in New York City
Our vision is not simply to open a building. It is to create a Haven: a place where families feel seen, heard, respected, and cared for.
Why Haven Matters
Access to midwifery care and birth center care has not been equitable. Too many families, especially Black, Brown, immigrant, low income, and historically underserved families, face barriers to respectful, culturally responsive maternity care and meaningful birth options.
Haven Midwifery Collective is committed to helping change that. We envision a future in which families across New York City can access compassionate, high quality, midwife led care close to home.
We believe that everyone deserves the opportunity to enter pregnancy and parenthood feeling supported. We believe that birth can be safe, powerful, and transformative. And we believe that community centered birth care can help families thrive.
Growing Haven Together
Haven Midwifery Collective is building toward New York City’s next birth center with the support of our community. Every contribution, conversation, and act of advocacy brings us closer to opening a space where families can receive the care they deserve.
Together, we can create a future where more people have access to safe, loving, midwifery led care through pregnancy, birth, and beyond.
Birth Center Frequently Asked Questions
What is a birth center?
A birth center is a healthcare setting for people with healthy pregnancies who are expecting an uncomplicated birth. Birth centers are designed to provide skilled midwifery care in a calm, comfortable, home like environment.
Birth centers support physiologic birth, meaning labor and birth are supported as normal body processes while midwives closely monitor the health and wellbeing of the birthing person and baby.
How is a birth center different from a hospital?
A birth center is not a hospital and does not provide surgery, epidural anesthesia, or intensive newborn care. Instead, birth centers offer midwifery led care for healthy people whose pregnancies remain low risk.
Many families choose a birth center because they want more time with their care team, freedom to move during labor, personal support, and a setting that feels private and welcoming.
Who can give birth at a birth center?
Birth center care is generally appropriate for people with healthy, low risk pregnancies who are expecting one baby, a head down baby, and a full term birth.
Your midwife will review your health history, pregnancy, and birth goals throughout prenatal care. If a health concern develops or care in a hospital becomes the safer choice, your midwife will discuss the next steps with you.
Are birth centers safe?
Safety is the foundation of birth center care. Birth centers are designed for healthy, low risk pregnancies and use ongoing assessment to help ensure that families receive care in the setting that best meets their needs.
Birth center midwives are trained to recognize concerns, provide initial emergency care, and arrange consultation or transfer to a hospital when a higher level of care is needed. A thoughtful transfer plan is an important part of safe maternity care.
What happens if I need to go to the hospital?
A hospital transfer is not a failure. It is a normal part of a maternity care system that puts the health and safety of the birthing person and baby first.
A transfer may be recommended during pregnancy, labor, birth, or after birth if additional evaluation, medication, pain relief, surgery, or newborn care is needed. Haven Midwifery will support clear communication, continuity of care whenever possible, and respectful collaboration with hospital teams.
Can I have pain relief at a birth center?
Birth centers do not offer epidural anesthesia. Midwives support comfort in labor through movement, position changes, breathing, rest, nourishment as appropriate, water therapy when available, massage, warmth, and continuous emotional support.
Families are encouraged to explore comfort options and create a birth plan that reflects their needs and preferences.
Can my partner, children, family, or doula be present?
Birth centers welcome the people who help you feel safe, supported, and loved. Haven Midwifery will work with each family to help create a welcoming birth experience while maintaining a calm and safe environment.
Specific visitor guidance will be shared as Haven develops its care policies and birth center space.
What care will Haven Midwifery offer?
Haven Midwifery Collective is working to create a welcoming, community centered birth center in New York City. Our vision is to provide respectful, culturally responsive, midwifery led care through pregnancy, birth, and the postpartum period.
Haven plans to offer prenatal education, individualized midwifery care, labor and birth support, newborn care in the early hours after birth, postpartum support, feeding support, and connection to community resources.
What will the Haven birth center feel like?
Haven is being imagined as a place where families feel seen, heard, respected, and cared for. The space will be designed to support privacy, comfort, movement, rest, family connection, and informed decision making.
Our goal is to create a true haven where birth is honored as both a health experience and a meaningful family event.
Will Haven serve all communities?
Haven Midwifery Collective is committed to expanding access to respectful, high quality birth center care. We believe that Black, Brown, immigrant, low income, and historically underserved families deserve meaningful choices and compassionate maternity care.
Our vision is to build a birth center that is rooted in equity, community, dignity, and love.
How can I join the Haven community?
There are many ways to be part of Haven as we build a future birth center for New York City. Sign up for our email list to receive updates about our progress, upcoming events, educational resources, volunteer opportunities, and ways to support Haven’s mission.
You can also stay connected by following Haven Midwifery Collective on social media. We will share news, community stories, birth education, event announcements, and opportunities to help shape the future of midwifery led birth center care in New York City.
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Website: https://havenmidwifery.org/