All three of my children were born in the late 1980s and early 1990s – just at the beginning of the "birthing room" wave. This was when hospitals were finally beginning to realize that while giving birth in a sterile environment was great, giving birth in a sterile-looking environment wasn't so pleasant.

To cater to the wishes of laboring women and their families, pretty curtains began to appear in the windows of labor and delivery rooms. Beds with detachable ends were rolled in so labor and delivery could take place in the same room. Rocking chairs were put in a corner so Dad would have a place to sit.

While it was an improvement, the small rooms were too crowded for the number of people needed for the actual delivery. Complications, even minor ones, could not be dealt with in these rooms, so Mom was immediately whisked off, leaving Dad to worry. Even when there were no complications, Mom was often confined to the tiny room without space to move around, often without a private bathroom, and the one hard rocking chair wasn't a comfortable parking place for Dad during a long labor. As for having any other relatives in the room – forget it. There just wasn't space.

This was the situation at New York Methodist Hospital when Dr. Rebecca Shiffman took over as director of obstetrics in 1990. As one of the first maternity facilities in Brooklyn, New York Methodist has a long history in obstetrics, but when Dr. Shiffman arrived she immediately recognized the need to modernize the existing facilities.

"We had three birthing rooms that were very inadequate as far as facilities for the patient and her family members, and the design was unwieldy as far as nursing was concerned," says Dr. Shiffman. "Our new chairman came in at about the same time, and he agreed that rebuilding and expanding labor and delivery was a priority."

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