Need for more reviews
I admire and respect Dr. Tom Benedetti for taking on a medical problem that should not be happening [“Baby’s birth day can be risky if rushed, hospitals are told,” news, Dec. 31].

“First, do no harm,” a principle of medical practice since Hippocrates, was being ignored. And a medical practice cliché, “unencumbered by data,” has allowed physicians to choose convenience over safety. No more. Benedetti has provided the data that cannot be ignored by physicians nor by expectant parents.

Poor outcomes and costly outcomes are the business of all of us. Beyond this obstetric issue, we need to encourage more reviews of assumed to be best practices and embrace evidence-based medical care. We can be proud of the locally grown Robert Bree Collaborative for providing an effective forum to address these issues.

We can be proud of UW professor Benedetti. It can be lonely being the bearer of uncomfortable truth.

—Larry Donohue, Seattle