Opening the Pelvic Brim with Walcher’s Position

by Gail Tully | March 1, 2011

This past year, two labors I attended benefited (meaning we avoided a cesarean each time) from a technique shared over a hundred years ago by Dr. Walcher. The first of these mothers labored for her third homebirth after four previous cesareans. She’d had a hard time getting her first baby into her pelvis (lying in bed) and was given a c-section at 3 cm and then she had three more cesareans in following years. Umm hmm. So, I was honored to help at her first homebirth, her fifth child. He also took a long time to engage. Beginning posterior, a variety of positions eventually got him through. Her second homebirth occurred after a long latent phase but before her midwife arrived.