Some families wish to take the baby's placenta home to bury it. Others would like to take the placenta home for consumption. In most cases it is fine to take your placenta home for burial or consumption as long as you follow the basic health and safety precautions that are explained below.
Some bury it, some burn it and some still believe that it has a spiritual attachment to the baby and disposes of it carefully. Others who don't want to be bothered looking for the best site for burying or burning it, simply allow the hospitals where they delivered their babies to dispose of it.
To ensure the safety of those handling the placenta, your placenta will double-bagged and sealed in a plastic waste bag and then placed in a rigid walled leak-proof container for storage and transport. The container will be labelled with a date, your name and “Human tissue for collection” on the lid of the container.
However, the placenta from birth has value to the baby and family after delivery. The placenta can be saved for the family or donated for others to utilize. Still, the placenta is an organ and should never be bought or sold. The placenta is a precious organ that has medical value.
The most common placenta preparation — creating a capsule — is made by steaming and dehydrating the placenta or processing the raw placenta. People have also been known to eat the placenta raw, cooked, or in smoothies or liquid extracts.
If you eat it "fresh" or raw, it might spread infection. Even processing your placenta by putting it in capsules might spoil it with bacteria or viruses. Some hospitals may not allow you to take it or eat it.
Some families wish to take the baby's placenta home to bury it. Others would like to take the placenta home for consumption. In most cases it is fine to take your placenta home for burial or consumption as long as you follow the basic health and safety precautions that are explained below.
There is no cost to you whatsoever. Donating your baby's placenta is considered a gift and payment for donated tissue and organs is illegal under the National Organ Transplant Act of 1984.
Hospitals treat placentas as medical waste or biohazard material. The newborn placenta is placed in a biohazard bag for storage. Some hospitals keep the placenta for a period of time in case the need arises to send it to pathology for further analysis.
You can expect to pay anywhere from $125 to $425 to have a company or doula encapsulate your placenta. If you choose to go the DIY route, you'll have to cover the cost of the equipment (like a dehydrator, rubber gloves, capsules, a capsule machine and a jar for storing the pills).
Request to take the placenta home
It is not uncommon for people to bring their baby's placenta home, bury it in the garden and plant a tree above it. You have the right to take your placenta home – speak to your midwife about the policy and how the hospital will support you. In this guide: When does labour start?
The Placental Tissue Donation Program is run in Sydney, NSW and is a part of Australian Tissue Donation Network's Living Donor Program. It gives patients, in Sydney, who are having an elective caesarean surgery, the opportunity to donate their placental tissue, which would otherwise have been discarded.
The hospital still does retain the right to keep a portion of the placenta for any testing, if necessary , but provided that a mother fills out a Content to Release Placenta form requesting the placenta, and then tests negative for certain infectious diseases, she's free to take it with her upon discharging from the ...
"Hospitals are very worried about safety, because the placenta really is a biohazard," says Titi Otunla, a certified nurse midwife at Texas Children's Pavilion for Women in Houston. "It's full of blood, it's not very sanitary-it could be a public health nightmare."
While most hospitals and birthing centers will automatically treat placentas as medical waste, mothers can request to keep them. In some cultures, families bury the placenta to honor this momentous organ and celebrate their baby's life.
That's because the placenta – an organ that develops on the wall of the uterus and helps sustain the fetus during pregnancy through nutrient-rich blood – is considered to be medical waste, like most organs or tissue removed during medical procedures.
Donate Your Placenta
The nutrient-dense tissue can help with reconstructive procedures, the healing of wounds and burns, ocular procedures, spinal surgeries, and other medical needs.
Delivering the placenta
But it's more likely your midwife will help deliver it by putting a hand on your tummy to protect your womb and keeping the cord pulled tight. This is called cord traction. Your placenta will come away, and the blood vessels that were holding on to it will close off as your womb gets smaller.
It is your choice what you do with your placenta. You may choose to discard it; in which case your hospital or birthing centre will take care of this. If you wish to take your placenta home, you can speak to your doctor or midwife to arrange this. In some cultures, people bury the placenta in a special place.
The placenta's purpose is to support and protect the baby in the womb. The mother and the baby have separate blood supplies, and the placenta enables the migration of nutrition and oxygen from the mother's blood to the baby's blood.
According to the information sheet, in NSW parents must obtain permission from the property owner and the local council before burying the placenta on private property. Notably, the placenta should not be buried less than 900 mm below the surface of the soil.
The placenta does not, technically, belong to the mother.
Our bodies may create it, but it is part of the developing child, which means it is also made up of 50 percent genetic material from the father.
Neither the ritual wash nor the shrouding is necessary for these babies. Placental tissue is considered part of the human body and should therefore be buried and not incinerated as presently happens in the United Kingdom.
In both Japanese and Chinese culture, the placenta burial is believed to bestow blessings or protection for the child's future.
Ezekiel 16:1-6. In this passage, God was speaking to the children of Israel that when they were born, their umbilical cord (placenta) was not properly treated and because of this they needed help. They were essentially living in the land of the dead and nobody pitied them.