Hospital birth
Record your preferences for labor, monitoring, pain relief and what to discuss if the team recommends surgery.
Personal and family documents
Birth plan
Write down the people you want with you, what matters during labor and delivery, and what you want to ask about your baby’s care. Bring a copy to the care team and revisit it if your plans change.
Create your birth planChoose the setting that fits your plans
Birth center
Identify the receiving hospital, limits of the center’s services and how to share your records if you transfer.
Home birth
Talk with the birth attendant about emergency calls, transportation and the actual place of delivery.
Planned cesarean
Prepare questions for the surgical and anesthesia teams and record preferences for the operating and recovery rooms.
Birth after cesarean
Review prior operative records and delivery options with the team. Record what you want to discuss before choosing a plan.
High-risk birth
Describe your individual care needs and how to communicate if the situation changes.
Support, consent and existing instructions
The care team should ask you directly while you can make the decision. Tell them whom to contact and what information you want shared. If you have an existing health-care appointment, court order or treatment instruction, identify where the team can obtain it and check its scope.
The person to notify in an emergency may be different from the person legally authorized to consent. California recognizes a temporary personal designation to the treating provider or facility designee. Washington has an ordered process for an adult who lacks decision-making capacity. Both the place of care and the issuing state of a document can matter.
Urgent care and blood products
Describe any products or techniques you would accept or decline, the circumstances you mean, and how the team can find separate instructions. Discuss the details and ask the team to document your decision. For a transfer, record where care is actually delivered. Federal hospital emergency screening and stabilization requirements depend on the encounter and include rules for informed refusal.
Federal hospital emergency care statuteNewborn screening and time-sensitive care
Check the program for the place where the baby is born. New York provides a defined religious objection and signed screening-refusal process. State eye-prophylaxis and vitamin K rules impose separate provider duties. California and Washington have different religious-objection and signature requirements. Ask the newborn team to verify laboratory results directly when discussing vaccine timing.
New York screening process · California program · Washington screening requirements
Sample birth plans
Explore birth plan examples
The first six examples use DC as the planned place of birth. The last names its own transfer location.
