Home Birth in the Netherlands: What to Know and How to Prepare
Updated: Aug 19
Originally published October 2025. Updated August 2026.
There is a moment, somewhere in the second trimester, when a woman who has moved to the Netherlands realises that giving birth at home is not only possible here — it is offered to her, calmly, as though it were the most ordinary thing in the world.
For some women that is a door opening. For others it creates a sense of confusion and at times bring them to question the way the care is provided. Both reactions make sense, and both usually have less to do with the evidence than with what we absorbed about birth long before we ever got pregnant.
This is not a piece telling you where to give birth. It is a piece to help you understand what is actually being offered, so that whatever you choose, you chose it.
How common is home birth in the Netherlands, really?
Less common than the Netherlands' reputation suggests, and less common than it was.
Around 13% of births in the Netherlands now take place at home. That is still far higher than almost anywhere else in the world — but it is a long way from the 1950s, when it was closer to eight in ten, and it has continued to fall over the last two decades.
Roughly a quarter of women begin labour in primary midwife-led care, which includes home, a birth centre, and a poliklinische bevalling — giving birth in the hospital but still under your own midwife rather than an obstetrician. The rest are already in secondary, obstetrician-led care by the time labour starts, usually for a medical reason identified during pregnancy.
Why the decline? Several things at once: more women being referred to obstetrician-led care during pregnancy, pressure on midwifery staffing, more first-time mothers wanting pain relief available, and a generation of parents who simply grew up expecting hospitals. None of that means home birth has become less safe. It means fewer women are choosing it.
Knowing the real number matters, because it changes what you are stepping into. Planning a home birth here is well-supported and entirely normal — but you may find you are the only person in your antenatal group doing it.
Who is home birth an option for?
Home birth in the Netherlands is offered to women whose pregnancy is considered low-risk and who are in primary midwifery care — no medical indication requiring an obstetrician, a single baby, head down, at term.
Whether that is you is a conversation with your own midwife, not something anyone else can tell you: not internet, not your friend, nor your doula, not me. Some conditions rule it out clearly. Others sit in a grey area your midwife will want to talk through with you properly.
If you are not eligible, that is not a lesser birth. In some ways the setting shapes a birth, however, it doesn't determine it.
What the evidence says — including the part that usually gets left out
The Dutch have studied this more thoroughly than anyone, because they have the numbers to do it.
The largest studies — including a nationwide cohort of over 743,000 low-risk births — have found no increased risk of perinatal death or serious complications for planned home birth compared with planned hospital birth among low-risk women in midwife-led care. Research has also found that women planning home births experience fewer interventions: less augmentation of labour, fewer episiotomies, more spontaneous births.
Now the part that is usually left out of doula blog posts, and shouldn't be.
These findings apply to low-risk women already in midwife-led care, in a system built for this — with trained midwives who carry emergency equipment, established transfer protocols, and hospitals close by. They are not a claim that home birth is safe for everyone, everywhere. And women who plan home births are, on average, already a lower-risk and better-supported group than those who don't, which accounts for part of the difference in interventions.
I include this not to undermine the evidence but because you deserve more context. A decision made on a partial picture isn't really a decision.
The part nobody prepares you for: transfer
This is the most useful thing in this post, so I want to give it room. Transfer to the hospital during labour is common, expected, and not an emergency in most cases.
In Dutch national data, around 38% of women who begin labour in primary midwifery care are transferred to the hospital during labour — but that number hides an enormous difference between first and subsequent babies. For first-time mothers it is around 57%. For women who have given birth before, it is around 22%.
Read that again if you are expecting your first baby. More than half of first-time mothers planning a primary-care birth end up transferring during labour. And most of those transfers are not emergencies.
The commonest reasons are labour slowing down and a recommendation for augmentation, wanting an epidural, or meconium in the waters — all sensible, unhurried reasons to move, most often in your own car, with your midwife coming with you.
I find important to share this information as clearly as possible, because I learned from experience over the years that a woman who transfers believing it to be rare, may experience it with emotional distress, unless supported in understanding what is happening and what normal.
Transfer is not the system rescuing you from a bad decision. It is the system doing exactly what it was designed to do: is responding in a very integrated way to labor unfolding.
My two cents: plan your home birth wholeheartedly. Pack the hospital bag anyway. Both things at once.
What is different about being at home
Pain relief. Pain medication such as epidural analgesia or syntethic opioids (remifentanil) are not available at home. If you want to have access to them, you transfer to the hospital (Birth Center makes for you available nitrous oxide). When we prepare for labor I always discuss pain relief options with my clients that opt for home birth: not because I assume that they will change their mind but because this is often a grey area and because some women want to feel that if they want, they can make a different choice. Home birth requires you to have a strong support team, to have spent time practicing breathing techniques under discomfort, learning and practicing birth positions, knowing how to support labor when it stalls, how to use hydrotherapy, comfort techniques, stay focused and motivated and how to rest smart to avoid exhaustion. Having a doula is valuable, not only to support you and your partner in getting through it emotionally and energetically, but also to make sure you have the physical support you need as labor progresses.
Your midwife stays when labor is established, and a kraamverzorgende typically joins for the birth itself and the following hours to support the first hours of integration.
Practical things. You'll be advised to raise the bed on blocks, and there's a kraampakket — a maternity kit — you order in advance, usually through your insurer, you can rent a birth pool, access freely to food, lit up the fireplace in winter and open all the windows in summer and move at your own rhythm.
Cost. A home birth is fully covered by Dutch basic insurance. A poliklinische bevalling without medical indication usually carries a contribution. Worth checking your policy.
Afterwards, you're in your own bed within the hour. No packing, no car, no unfamiliar corridor at 4am.
Questions worth taking to your midwife
These are the ones I encourage the women I work with to bring — not to challenge anyone, but because a good midwife would far rather you asked.
Am I a candidate for a home birth, and is there anything in my history that gives you pause?
What equipment do you bring, and what can you manage at home?
What are the most likely reasons we would transfer, and what would that look like practically?
What happens if labour starts very fast, or very slowly?
How do you feel about my birth plan?
That last one is worth asking. Midwives are people, and you want one who is genuinely at ease with your plan.
Where the fear lives
Often the deepest question isn't clinical at all.
Sometimes it's the birth your mother described to you when you were fourteen. Sometimes it's a first birth that frightened you. Sometimes it's a partner who isn't sure, and hasn't said so directly. Sometimes it's a whole culture behind you — Italian, American, Indian, Brazilian — where home birth sounds not brave but reckless, and where telling your family your plan means an argument you don't have energy for.
None of that shows up on a risk assessment, and all of it shapes a labour.
This is a great deal of what I do as a doula: not persuading anyone toward a home birth, but making room for the parts of the decision that don't fit into a fifteen-minute appointment. Working with fear rather than around it. Preparing your partner so he isn't holding his own panic while you labour. And being there through the night — whether that night ends in your bedroom or on a ward.
What is your why?
There are many reasons women choose to give birth at home: the familiar space, the desire to experience labor unrestricted and to feel more in control of the environment, the believe that their bodies are designed to give birth and the trust in their support team. If you feel that home birth might be right for you, I encourage you to understand your why and share it with your birth team: that will be your anchor, the thing you will need to come back to, over and over.
A note on my role
I am not a medical professional. I don't perform clinical checks, I don't give medical advice, and I don't comment on clinical decisions. I sit alongside you: making sure you understand what is being offered, that your questions get asked, that your care team knows what matters to you, and that you are not alone at four in the morning.
A doula becomes your companion, translator of culture, and your emotional and informational anchor. Here’s how:
Co-creating your birth plan that reflects your birth values, preferences, and cultural background. Helping you prepare for both a home birth and what to do if transfer is needed.
Bridging cultures and expectations, helping you understand Dutch midwifery norms and what is flexible vs what might be standard practice and how to deepen the conversation with your midwife.
Protecting your physiological birth space: helping you maintain comfort, reduce interruption, preserve privacy, support hormonal flow (oxytocin, endorphins) through environment, rituals, calm, touch.
Continuous emotional presence and decision support: being there with you during pregnancy for fears, questions; during labour to remind you of your strength; helping your partner support you too.
Post-birth integration: helping you process the experience, care for your body with Ayurvedic and traditional healing practices, ensuring rest, nourishment, emotional anchoring.
How can you best prepare if you want a Home Birth in NL
Choose a midwife early, ideally one who is comfortable answering your questions seriously.
Hire a doula that speaks your emotional language: the best tip is that in her presence you feel absolutely at ease.
Prepare for birth: CBE classes that not only give you framework but that makes you understand the physiology of labor, how the baby moves into the pelvis, how to support descent and that engourages your partner to work with you as a team.
Prepare your body as well as your mind: take care of your nutrition, lifestyle, make sure you book yourself a few massages towards the end of your pregnancy
Deep self-work: working with beliefs about birth, fears, previous narratives is so important to help you processing and let go of what you need to release and embrace.
Reassuring Truths
You are not alone in this—even though the system might feel foreign if you are an expat. Many have walked this path and found home birth deeply empowering.
Your body knows more than you think. When well supported, many of the automatic medical interventions can be avoided.
A well-prepared home birth with a midwife + doula and a supportive partner gives you both safety and autonomy.
If you are considering home birth, or just leaning toward trusting your body’s physiology more or are curious about VBAC, I’d love to hold space for you. Whether this is your first baby or you’ve birthed before, let’s connect in a free call and explore what feels aligned for you—honouring your history, your values, and your birth vision.
Last updated August 2026. Figures on home birth rates and intrapartum referral come from Dutch national perinatal data; safety findings from nationwide Dutch cohort studies of low-risk planned home and hospital births. This post is information, not medical advice — please discuss your own situation with your midwife.
Comments