OFFICE HOURS
24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

CONTACT
(802) 524-1040

ADDRESS
133 Fairfield Street
St. Albans, VT 05478

Directions

Welcome to Family Birth Center

Each baby is a new beginning—a new life story unfolding and a new chapter in a family’s life. Our Family Birth Center is a great place for new beginnings, offering many of the comforts of home, while providing the security of current technology. We support personalized birth experiences, including education in infant care and breast feeding.  This excellence was recently recognized at the state level by achieving “Blue Distinction Plus” for quality and cost effectiveness from Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Vermont.  It was also recognized at the national/international level recently, as our staff earned the prestigious “Baby Friendly” designation – joining St. Johnsbury as the only Vermont hospitals to achieve that level of excellence focused on supporting new moms and newborns.

Our passion is to provide highest level of quality care using current research to guide our evidence-based practices. Here on the Family Birth Center, we strive to make your experience a memorable one. Our nurses and providers truly care about what they do and pride themselves in their skills and personal approach to care. For those rare instances when even more specialized care is needed, we have strong relationships with the neonatal center at The University of Vermont Medical Center in Burlington. In addition to maternal and newborn care, we also provide care for a wide variety of women’s health needs, and pediatrics. We are proud to work closely with Northwestern OB/GYN, a full-service practice located right on NMC’s campus. Their experienced team of Board Certified OB/GYN physicians, a talented physician assistant, and office staff provides innovative approaches to prenatal care and c-sections and are a vital part of what makes having a baby on the Family Birth Center a wonderful experience for so many families. Click here to learn more about Northwestern OB/GYN

Tour our FBC

To schedule an in-person tour of the Family Birth Center,
please call: 802-524-1040

Key services

  • Breastfeeding education
  • Breastfeeding support
  • Labor and delivery
  • Lactation consultants
  • Maternity care
  • Pediatrics
  • Postpartum care
  • Woman's health care

Your birthing experience

Giving birth is a memorable experience for the whole family. When you arrive at our birthing center, your nurse will bring you to your private room, assess your contractions, and listen to your baby’s heartbeat with an external fetal heart monitor. At this time, your nurse will need to ask you questions about your health history and your pregnancy. You may want to ask your support people to wait in the hallway during this time to respect your privacy.
 
 
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Birthing accommodations

Our private labor and birthing room is a spacious, home-like environment. Your bed breaks down to become a delivery bed. Each room has a pull-out sleeper couch for your support people, cable TV, a phone, a radiant warmer, a pram for your baby, a private bathroom, and a shower with a removable hand-held shower head and a pull down bench to use as you wish. 

We also supply you with many of the items you may need during your stay, including: gowns, robes, socks, lotion, chap-stick, mouthwash, toothbrush and paste, shampoo and conditioner, comb, towels, mesh underwear, pads, and several pillows and blankets. 
 
 
 

Mother-baby couplet care

After recovery, you will be together with your baby and support person in the comfort of your own private postpartum room across the hall.  This is where you’ll be for the rest of your stay.  Your room will have a shower, recliner or pull out chair-bed, your baby’s pram, a phone, and cable TV.   We encourage “rooming-in” with your baby (baby does not spend time in a nursery) to help you learn how to sooth your baby, recognize and immediately act on your baby’s feeding cues,  and encourage family bonding.  Nurses are always available to help support and educate you on caring for your baby. 
 
 

 

 

 

Labor Tub

The Family Birth Center’s private tub room provides an opportunity for immersion in water which can benefit laboring mothers by shortening labor, easing pain and, in some cases, reducing the need for anesthesia. 

Did you know?

Our team of providers will welcome you to the Family Birth Center with both a depth of knowledge and a warm, friendly approach. Here are just some of the elements that set us apart from other birthing centers.
  • 33% of our Registered Nurses also hold higher certifications in specialty areas such as Obstetrics, Labor and Delivery, and Newborn Care. 
  • All of our nurses have had extensive training in order to help support breastfeeding. We also provide access to International Board Certified Lactation Consultants onsite to help with breastfeeding.
  • We provide an individualized plan of care based on each patient’s specific needs.
  • We are progressive in patient education and ensure our patients go home with the knowledge they need to appropriately care for themselves and their children. 
  • Access to an International Board Certified Lactation Consultants onsite to help with breastfeeding.

For women who require a hospital stay

We provide care for women who require a hospital stay after any gynecological or breast care procedures including laparoscopic and vaginal hysterectomies, mastectomies and prolapse corrections.  After your surgery you will spend your recover time in the Post-Anesthesia Care Unit (PACU) before joining us in the second floor Family Birth Center, where you will remain for the rest of your stay. Your room will have a recliner and pull out bed-chair for use by your support person. Your room will also have a bathroom, shower, phone, and cable TV. Your nurse will work closely with you to manage your pain and help with healing.