Physicians sue Missouri over midwifery law

Doctor organizations joined to file a lawsuit after certified professional midwives won independent practice.

By Myrle Croasdale, AMNews staff. Aug. 13, 2007.

Four Missouri physician organizations have sued to have declared unconstitutional a law that would allow certified professional midwives to deliver babies without collaborating with a physician.

In July, a state judge granted the groups -- Missouri State Medical Assn., Missouri Assn. of Osteopathic Physicians and Surgeons, Missouri Academy of Family Physicians and St. Louis Metropolitan Medical Society -- a restraining order preventing the law from going into effect on Aug. 28. As of press time in late July, the Circuit Court of Cole County, 19th Judicial Circuit, was expected to reconsider the restraining order on Aug. 2.

In June, Gov. Matt Blunt signed into law a bill to make health insurance more affordable for the state's citizens. The law includes a provision granting certified professional midwives the right to practice independently.

Previously, delivering babies was considered the practice of medicine, limited to a physician or a nurse-midwife working with a physician.

The lawsuit brought by the physician organizations said when the health insurance bill was withdrawn from the Senate floor to incorporate wording for an amendment, an unrelated provision was added. That provision used the word "tocological" (related to the science of childbirth, midwifery or obstetrics), the lawsuit states, and the Senate was unaware of the word's meaning.

The Missouri Constitution states that no bill shall contain more than one subject, and that subject should be clearly expressed in the bill's title. The lawsuit also notes that another bill with a provision clearly addressing midwives' scope of practice failed.