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A surprising, first-of-its kind study from Stanford University reveals that women have a greater risk of complications during and after childbirth — including induced labor, postpartum hemorrhaging, and even having twins or triplets — if their partner is female instead of male. “The disparities faced by people who were mothers in partnership with a mother were striking,” said Stephanie Leonard, a Stanford instructor and lead author of the study being published Monday in the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology. (Asimov, 3/28)

Mandy King laid back on a large, brown couch at Shiphrah Birth Services in Vinton, Iowa, as soft piano music streamed from a TV in the background. Her three young children — ages 3, 5 and 7 — played next to her as her midwife, Bethany Gates, examined her pregnant belly, applying pressure with her hands on different parts to identify the baby's position. On this early spring day, King was 38 weeks pregnant. “Her head's not really moving a lot,” Gates said. “She's kind of settling into the pelvis a little bit, but that's good. That's what we want her to do.” King is planning her first home birth. As a self-described homebody, King said she disliked giving birth at a hospital, away from the comfort of her home and children. (Krebs, 3/28)

For the first time in his life, 15-month-old Kendall Jurnakins is home. The baby boy spent the first year of his life in the neonatal intensive care unit at Ascension St. Vincent Women's Hospital in Indianapolis before being cleared for discharge on March 16. (Yu, 3/28)

When the woman called Planned Parenthood to schedule her abortion, Alexandria Ball picked up the phone and explained exactly what would happen next. Ball and her colleagues would book her bus ticket to Illinois. They would put her up in a hotel. They would help find funding for her abortion. And they would pay for her 15-year-old son to come along. “Is this a dream?” asked the pregnant mother from western Missouri. Attached to an abortion clinic on the Missouri-Illinois border, this first-of-its-kind call center offers a window into the splintered future of abortion care in the United States if the Supreme Court decides this summer to roll back Roe v. Wade, the landmark decision that established a constitutional right to abortion. (Kitchener, 3/28)

KHN: Colorado Doubles Down On Abortion Rights As Other States — And The High Court — Reconsider

With the Supreme Court expected to overturn or severely weaken its landmark Roe v. Wade decision, clinics in Colorado are preparing for an increase in the number of out-of-state residents seeking abortions, and lawmakers are cementing abortion access protections in state law. Colorado is one of the few states without any restrictions on when in pregnancy an abortion can occur and is one of the few states in the region without a mandatory waiting period of up to 72 hours after required abortion counseling. (Bichell, 3/29)

While a lot of the bills this year look similar to bills we’ve seen before, the stakes are completely different. In recent years, the most restrictive bans were blocked by the courts, ruled unconstitutional because they violated Supreme Court precedent established in Roe v. Wade, which has protected the constitutional right to abortion for nearly 50 years. (Kitchener, Schaul and Santamarina, 3/26)