The benefits of booking an independently-run antenatal course…

Yes, I am somewhat biased here: I don’t work for the NHS, nor am I employed by a national brand to deliver antenatal course. I am fully independent and I have really good reasons for that.

Understanding these reasons is the key to choose the right antenatal course for you.

It’s logical that nationwide antenatal brand are most well known… 

Names of organisations like NCT, and the Positive Birth Company are common features of conversation at every mum & baby group…

This might surprise you, but this blog post isn’t about whether the big national antenatal organisations are doing a good job or not. Birth is never a one-size-fits-all affair and the same is true for antenatal courses. In reality, for every rave Trust Pilot review an ‘NCT’ or ‘Happy Parent, Happy Baby’ course gets, there’s a Mumsnet thread filled with split opinions.  

What this post is about, is why so many parents sign up to these courses in the first place. 

As a doula, I speak to a lot of new parents…

… and we always chat about their birth preparation journey.  

Honestly, you’d be surprised how frequently these phrases appear in our conversations:

• “I did a Google search and it popped up at the top…”

• “Everytime I went online, I saw the adverts…”

• “My midwife mentioned it so I booked it…” 

Hearing this again and again is the final piece of the puzzle: these big national branded courses are the obvious choice, not because of their content or results, but simply because they are obvious. 

I don’t doubt for a minute that their courses are good: the nationwide antenatal courses are designed for purpose by obstetricians and midwives, and are delivered by people trained to do so.

But then, so is mine (and the courses of other doulas like me, I just can’t speak for them). My antenatal courses are rooted firmly in science, physiology and experience within the birth world. I’m also a trained doula, antenatal teacher and very experienced teacher.

So what makes their antenatal offerings so different to mine? 

That’s easy: marketing.

Their brand names are constantly visible, appearing at the top of every online search and with cookie-tracked pop-ups filtering into your mobile. Trust me when I say that all takes specialist work. 

What’s really important to know about these big nationwide organisations is that they have whole departments of people with degree level knowledge in online marketing and journalism constantly managing their web presence. 

This is why their courses are ‘everywhere’ and so many people do them; it’s not necessarily the content or the quality that gets them the footfall, it’s the marketing machine.  

Ultimately, it’s business.  

But birth preparation isn’t the same as business…

Humans have a herd mentality: if the majority of people are doing something it must be a good option to take. But a marketed majority doesn’t tell us much.  

Luckily, recent research has been far more helpful about what makes something a good option for antenatal education and birth preparation.  

Research shows that doing a good antenatal course before birth has the potential to boost your birthing experience, empowering and equipping women by:   

• improving the way you experience labour

• giving you greater confidence in making decisions during labour 

• improving health outcomes for mum and baby. 

But (and this is a big but) that depends on the course being a good - aka suitable - fit for the people doing the course. And since COVID, needs and priorities have shifted. Recent studies that have explored the role of antenatal education have found that finding a ‘good’ course provides: 

• relevant, reliable and trustworthy information

• flexibility in timings and accessibility

• diversity in content and values (i.e. it’s personalised)  

While marketing may put the big antenatal companies right in front of us, making them seem like the obvious and best option, in reality, they’re not always best placed to hit those values. 

National antenatal companies and organisations are by definition generic: they have to be to work efficiently on this enormous scale. Course content, timings, training style: these will all be generalised to ensure universal standards of quality. Makes sense.

• But how can that be personalised to include someone with a high-risk pregnancy?

• Or a couple from a minority group?

• Or even the conditions of the local trust and hospital? 

The answer is(in my humble opinion) that it can’t.

The centrally designed and partially scripted content delivered by antenatal teachers who are trained to deliver in a specific style and way means that these courses are great if you want something generic. 

But if you want to feel like YOU matter most, an independent antenatal course may well be the way to go. 

So, what are the benefits of independent antenatal courses…

I made an active choice not to ‘train up’ to work for NCT or a similar organisation: I knew that to really help people birth better, Born to Birth Cornwall had to be independent…

While I cannot speak for every independent antenatal teacher - doula or otherwise - for me the benefits of being totally independent are these: 

1. My course is rooted in the local experience:

I spend my life working in the Cornish birth world, not for organisations but for the families. I go to the birth centres, meet the midwifery teams, the hospitals but always through the eyes of my clients. Day-in, day-out, I witness the trends within the trust, the pros and the cons of our specific system, and how they play out for families. My courses allow me to prepare you for that impartially. 

2.The responsibility for my content reliability lies with me:

I don’t get sent updates from head office: I am head office and I am also super conscious of keeping up to date with latest advice and research on the things that matter to people giving birth. Really, I take this very seriously.  

3. I have a core course content, but it always changes:

Personalising my sessions to meet the needs in the room is so important to me. As an experienced teacher, I know how to do this but I need the info! Giving every couple an online questionnaire to fill in before we begin allows me to plan for whatever priorities they have, fears they have or things they’re aiming for. Every session is tweaked and developed to help me meet those things; that’s just not possible if courses are standardised.

Once again this all comes down to what you want: if you’re after a generic course that skims the surface, a national brand antenatal course like NCT or Happy Parent, Happy Baby will probably fit your needs. 

BUT if you know that you deserve more, feel like you need to understand your real and unbiased options, and want to learn how to approach your birth your way, then perhaps an independent antenatal course like mine is a better fit. You’ll just need to scroll a little further down the Google results to find it (or alternatively take a look here)