Enjoy a Private, State-of-the-Art Delivery Experience

Having a baby is one of life’s big moments, and where you choose to deliver your baby can make a difference. At the Cherese Mari Laulhere BirthCare Center, we’re there for you every step of the way, whether it’s a routine or complex pregnancy. Throughout your birthing journey, our high-performing, dedicated center for expectant women provides compassionate, quality healthcare tailored to your birth plan, preferences and needs.

Choose the Best for You and Your Baby


US News & World Report Maternity Best Hospital Award BadgeMemorialCare Miller Children’s & Women’s Hospital Long Beach has been recognized as High Performing in Maternity Care (Uncomplicated Pregnancy) by U.S. News & World Report, making it the only children’s and women’s hospital in LA and Orange Counties to receive this recognition during the magazine’s first year of publishing a list of Best Hospitals for Maternity Care. Miller Children’s & Women’s is unique as it’s the only hospital of its kind in the region bringing together maternity and pediatric specialty services under one roof to keep the family unit connected — which is crucially important when high-risk maternity care, pediatric specialty and neonatal intensive care are needed by mom and baby.

Our BirthCare Center offers:

  • Private labor and delivery suites with state-of-the-art birthing beds
  • 24/7 onsite team of maternal-fetal specialists, OB hospitalists, neonatologists and nurse specialists
  • ‘Level IV’ Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) gives you and your baby everything you might need in one attractive location
  • Reduced risk and fewer C-sections performed compared to state averages
  • Extensive lactation support
  • 24/7 high-risk maternity and neonatal transports
  • Comprehensive program of research, diagnosis, treatment, educational resources, maternity classes, and individual and family support programs, all conveniently located under one roof and within a full-service children’s hospital

Choose the experienced team at the BirthCare Center. We’ll be there for you prenatal, postpartum, and every moment -- big or little -- in between.

Complete a Pre-admission Form

Resources

Your Cesarean Delivery: Information Regarding Your Birth Experience

This handbook should be used as a guide to help you understand your surgery and recovery, and answer questions that you may have.

    Your Pregnancy Guide

    Your Pregnancy Guide is filled with information, tips and answers to most questions for every step of your pregnancy journey.

    A New Beginning - Your Personal Guide to Caring for Yourself & Your Baby

    In an effort to increase education, we provide moms with a new education book after delivery. It has a wealth of information about postpartum changes, breastfeeding education, postpartum depression, baby care, immunization, and car seat safety. We hope this helps ease the transition between the hospital and home with a new baby.

    In addition, we’ve partnered with Twistle, to send messages, reminders, and other useful health education directly from your health care team to your mobile device after you leave the hospital with your new baby.

    Visiting Guidelines

    The BirthCare Center is committed to providing a safe, compassionate and nurturing environment during the birth experience. We consider visitors an integral part of the mother’s experience.

    Note: Under certain circumstances, the hospital may restrict or limit visitation privileges to ensure the health and safety of patients, staff and visitors.

    Antepartum Testing & Labor Evaluation/Triage:

    • One Partner in Care may accompany patient.

    Labor & Delivery and Perinatal Special Care Unit (Rooms 1 - 24, 270 - 281):

    • Depending on the patient’s condition, up to three Partners in Care will receive a room pass, which must be worn at all times. COVID-19 restrictions may change this. See link above. 
    • The Labor & Delivery waiting area is reserved for patients awaiting evaluation or admission.
    • The “Golden Hour” (first hour after birth) 
      is reserved for the newborn to bond with mother and primary Partner in Care. All other support persons will be asked to wait in the Main Lobby located on the 1st Floor.

    Mother-Baby Unit (Rooms 201 - 260):

    • Visiting Hours: 9 a.m. - 3 p.m. and 5 - 9 p.m., up to three visitors.
    • Quiet Time: 3 - 5 p.m. Only mother and Partner in Care at this time.
    • These are all private rooms with big windows and a sleeper chair for one partner to spend the night. 
    Preparing for Labor & Delivery
    Before Labor

    Is it time? Your bags are packed and you’re ready to go. You’re feeling contractions. Still, true labor may not have yet begun. Sometimes, trying to tell the difference between true and false labor can be difficult, even downright discouraging, and every women’s experience is different. Be patient, and know the signs of true labor. These include:

    • Strong contractions that are getting closer together. Contractions are felt “all over” rather than just in the abdomen.
    • Bloody stool: Loss of mucus plug – a thick brown mucus discharge that may be mixed with blood.
    • Membranes or “water” may rupture.

    There are three stages of labor. The first begins with the onset of contractions and ends when the cervix is dilated to 10 centimeters. The second stage involves delivering the baby and the third stage involves delivery of the placenta and membranes, or "afterbirth."

    Ready, Set, Not Yet

    These last weeks of pregnancy sometimes seem to go on forever. Contractions may get stronger at times and make you wonder if this could be it. Sometimes it is frustrating to come to the hospital with these labor pains, only to be sent home with your baby still inside rather than in your arms.

    True labor contractions will cause changes in your cervix. Contractions may stop or your labor may be in its early stages. This pre-labor period is helping the body get ready for the big day, but not yet. We recommend that this early pre-labor period is best spent in places you find comfortable. In the mean time, if you are finding it difficult to concentrate on anything but the birth of your baby, here are some tips to help keep you comfortable through the hours, days or weeks while you are waiting.

    If labor has stopped or slowed down…

    • Sleep or just rest.
    • Snuggle with or be close to your partner.
    • Eat or drink something.
    • Go for a walk.
    • Get a foot, hand, shoulder or back massage.
    • Go shopping.
    • Go to a movie or rent the funniest video you can find.
    • Go to your favorite room in your home and slowly relax each part of your body.
    • Remind yourself that you will not be pregnant forever.
    During Labor

    The length of labor is different for every woman. In general, a woman’s first childbirth will be her longest. After the first baby, labor is usually shorter. About half of women will have a labor that lasts at least 12 hours. Here are some ways to cope with labor as contractions get stronger:

    • Go for a walk.
    • Rock in a rocking chair.
    • Take a shower or bath.
    • Slow dance.
    • Relax between contractions.
    • Change positions often.
    • Find someone to tell you what a good job you are doing.
    • Try slow deep breathing.
    • Drink water, juice or other clear liquids.
    • Use lip balm on dry lips.
    • Watch a movie.
    • Hold hands with someone you love.
    • Pray.
    • Suck on a sour lollipop or popsicle.
    • Cool yourself with a washcloth dipped in ice water.
    • Use the bathroom often.
    • For lower backache, try ice packs, heat or switch between hot and cold. Use a tennis ball, rolling pin or doorknob for counter pressure.
    • Congratulate yourself for being such a patient new parent.
    • Think of the baby coming down and out to meet you soon.

    Miller Children’s & Women's supports both Lamaze and medicated deliveries. If you choose epidural pain relief during labor and delivery or require a cesarean section, our anesthesiologists are on staff and in the hospitals at all times to provide quality care.

    For more information about the stages of labor and what to expect, sign up to attend an educational class.

    Coming to the Hospital
    What to Bring

    You should have a small bag, containing the personal articles you wish to bring to the hospital packed and ready to go. These may include:

    For You

    • Pajama tops or short nighties (remember to buy appropriate nursing gowns if you will be breastfeeding)
    • Robe and slippers (washable)
    • Toiletries:
      • Toothpaste/toothbrush
      • Shampoo/conditioner
      • Soap
      • Deodorant
      • Shower cap
    • Two bras (remember nursing bras, if you’re nursing — they are available at our breastfeeding supply store)
    • Clothing to go home in (bring some of your early maternity clothes)

    For Your Baby

    • Car Seat
      • All babies who are discharged from the hospital must go home in a car seat. Miller Children’s & Women's will not let a baby leave the hospital if there is not proof of one. It also is recommended that car seat and safety belt laws are followed for any child that leaves the hospital in a car.
    • One outfit to go home in
    • One blanket
    • One T-shirt
    Where to Park

    When you are ready to deliver, you will enter the hospital through the Cherese Mari Laulhere BirthCare Center entrance, which is on Columbia St. between Atlantic Ave. and Long Beach Blvd. There are a few designated parking spots where you can park while you check in.

    After you have been checked in to a birthing suite, the car you arrived in will need to be moved. Have your partner in care or another family member, move your car to the main visitor parking lot on Memorial Medical Center Dr.

    Once the car is parked, your partner in care will enter through the main Long Beach Medical Center lobby and take the elevators to the 2nd Floor turning right when they exit. A second check-in is not necessary, but your visitor badge is required.

    Photography & Videography

    We know the birth of your baby is a special time, and realize many families may want to photograph, video record or otherwise preserve this important moment. However, the care team has the right to be excluded from recordings and may not wish to be photographed. Therefore, please discuss plans/preferences for recording prior to the delivery of your child. Additionally, recordings may at times interfere with their ability to provide urgently needed care to the birth parent and baby, so the staff also reserve the right to require you to stop recording even if consent had been previously granted. Posting images of our staff on social media is not permitted. Also, recording of other patients is never allowed.

    Newborn Photos

    Newborn photos are available on Mom365.com

    Birth Certificates
    Birth Certificates

    Birth certificate copies are not available through the hospital.

    Depending on when you or your child was born, you will need to contact either:

    • City of Long Beach
    • Los Angeles County Recorder’s Office
    • County of Orange Health Care Agency
    • Orange County Clerk-Recorder

    Born within one year at Miller Children’s & Women's:
    City of Long Beach Department of Health and Human Services
    (562) 570-4305

    Born more than a year ago at Miller Children’s & Women's:
    Los Angeles County Recorder’s Office
    (562) 462-2137 or (562) 462-2103

    California Paternity Opportunity Program

    The California Paternity Opportunity Program (POP) was established in 1995 to comply with federal mandate (Title 42 United States Code (USC) 666(a)(5)(C)) that requires every state to operate a simple system to establish paternity, or a legal determination for fatherhood for unmarried biological parents. For more than 24 years, California’s POP has helped over 3.4 million parents establish legal paternity.

    When parents are unmarried, there are only two ways to establish legal paternity: through the court system, or by signing a Declaration of Paternity, (CS 909). POP provides an unmarried mother and a biological father the opportunity to voluntarily establish legal paternity for their child by signing a Declaration of Paternity (CS 909). Participation in POP free of charge, and voluntarily signing a CS 909 significantly decreases the time and money required to establish legal paternity through the court process. A signed CS 909 has the same force and effect as a judgement for paternity issued by a court. Although the POP program resides under the California Department of Child Support Services, POP is not involved with the judicial method of establishing paternity, genetic testing, custody, financial or child support aspects.

    When parents are unmarried, the father must complete a CS 909 or provide proof of a court order establishing paternity before adding his name to a birth certificate. The Federal Welfare Reform Act requires that a Declaration of Paternity form be signed by both parents in the presence of a witness and/or notarized before the father can be added to the birth certificate. California Health and Safety Code 102425(a)(C) states, “If the parents are not married to each other, the father’s name shall not be listed on the birth certificate unless the father and the mother sign a voluntary declaration of paternity at the hospital before the birth certificate is submitted for registration. The birth certificate may be amended to add the father’s name at a later date only if paternity for the child has been established by a judgment of a court of competent jurisdiction or by the filing of a voluntary declaration of paternity.”

    Birthing hospitals are mandated to offer parents the CS 909 in the hospital, upon the birth of their child. POP’s goal is to share information on our program prior to a child’s birth, so that parents are informed prior to completing required documents at the hospital. Our goal is to have parents understand their rights, responsibilities, alternatives, and consequences when signing the form, and to have the opportunity to ask questions and educate themselves prior to completing the CS 909.

    CertaScan

    Miller Children’s & Women’s has adopted an added security measure with the innovative Infant Safety System developed by CertaScan Technologies. The Infant Safety System is a security system that captures high-resolution newborn footprints that can be used for precise identification in situations that might cause separation between parent and baby, like a natural disaster.

    Like a fingerprint, a footprint never changes, but it is often difficult to capture a newborn’s fingerprints. Shortly after delivery, a nurse will bring in the scanner for a quick, 2-second scan of the baby’s feet. Once scanned, the prints are encrypted and securely storied in CertaScan Technologies’ highly protected storage cloud, as well as the baby’s medical record. Identifying medical information is stored securely and parents are given password-protected access after delivery.

    Because of these strict safety protocols, CertaScan has garnered the attention and praise of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) and the technology has been included as a recommendation for hospitals in its most recent Infant Security Guidelines.

    Along with being a safety feature at Miller Children’s & Women’s, CertaScan allows parents to be able to pull up their baby’s footprint up to a year after their birth. They can use the copy of the footprint for various keepsakes and print it out free of charge.

    This security measure is offered free of charge, and is not mandatory.

    Community Resources
    Postpartum Organizations
    Online Resources
    Education & Support
    • Nurturing the New You: Mom & Baby Support Group
      (Parent & Pre-Crawling Babies)
      Free Support Group
      Tuesdays 10 a.m. – noon
      No RSVP Required
      (562) 650-0474
    • Soul Food for Your Baby
      Community organization that empowers African American families to breastfeed with their heart, body, and soul.
    • Transitions in Motherhood Perinatal Mental Health, Long Beach
      Therapeutic Services: individual, couples, families and groups
      Spanish/English
      (562) 650-0474
    • South Bay Center for Counseling, El Segundo
      Therapeutic Services: individual, couples, families and groups
      (310) 414-2090
    • Jewish Family & Children’s Services, Long Beach
      Mental Health Services
      (562) 427-7916
    • St. Joseph Hospital, Orange
      Services for Maternal Depression
      (714) 771-8101
    • Orange County Health Care Agency
      Mental Health Services
      (800) 564-8448
    • The Guidance Center, Long Beach
      Mental Health Services
      (562) 485-3095
    • Pacific Asian Counseling Services
      (310) 337-1550
    • USC Maternal Wellness Clinic
      Maternal Depression Care
      (323) 409-5370
    • The National Hopeline Network
      (800) SUICIDE (784-2433)
    Books on Perinatal Mood & Anxiety Disorders
    • This Isn’t What I Expected
      Karen Kleiman, MSW, and Valerie Raskin, M.D.
    • Beyond the Blues: A Guide to Understanding and Treating Prenatal and Postpartum Depression
      Pec Indman, MFT, and Shoshanna Bennett, PhD
    • The Mother to Mother Postpartum Depression Support Book
      Sandra Poulin
    • The Postpartum Husband: Practical Solutions for Living with Postpartum Depression
      Karen Kleiman, MSW
    • Life Will Never Be The Same: The Real Mom’s Postpartum Survival Guide
      Ann L. Dunnewold, PhD, and Diane G. Sanford, PhD
    • Shouldn’t I Be Happy? Emotional Problems of Pregnancy and Postpartum Women
      Shaila Misri, M.D.
    • Non-Pharmacologic Treatments for Depression in New Mothers
      Kathleen Kendall-Tacket, PhD, IBCLC

    Centers & Programs

    Your Care Team

    Miller Children’s & Women's works with a team of highly trained obstetricians and family medicine physicians. The perinatal and maternity care teams are sensitive to the needs of women and committed to providing a high level of patient-and-family-centered care.

    Obstetricians & Family Medicine Physicians

    Other Team Members

    Maternal-Fetal Medicine Specialists

    Miller Children’s & Women's offers a team of highly trained obstetricians, maternal-fetal medicine specialists (perinatologists), neonatologists, pediatricians, nurses and other specialists. The perinatal and maternity care teams are sensitive to the needs of women and committed to providing a high level of patient and family-centered care.

    A maternal-fetal medicine specialist, or perinatologist, is an obstetrician who specializes in treating the fetus/baby and mother during pregnancy, labor and delivery, particularly when the mother and/or baby are at a high-risk for complications.

    Currently providing services within Miller Children’s & Women's.

    OB Hospitalists

    Miller Children’s & Women’s is proud to have a team of OB hospitalists (laborists) on-site 24/7. OB hospitalists are solely dedicated to treating women for obstetrical issues, most often labor. These physicians do not see patients in an office, and only work in a hospital to oversee various obstetrical issues when needed. OB hospitalists provide care when a patient’s primary OB-GYN can’t get to the hospital in a timely manner. They are the trained experts on hand should an emergency arise. 

    OB hospitalists have extensive obstetrical training and significant experience in safe delivery techniques useful in difficult situations, such as a baby in breech position, multiple births, and extended labor. They can stay through the day or night with a woman in labor to help avoid unnecessary C-sections. Since the waiting time for births is unpredictable, and if the woman’s regular physician has to leave, the OB hospitalist can stay to guide the birth. 

    Individual OB-GYN practices determine their use of the OB hospitalist service, so it isn’t guaranteed that a woman in labor will see an OB hospitalist, or which one they will see. 

    Meet Our OB Hospitalists

    Lactation Consultants

    Lactation consultants are board-certified nurses who have advanced training in breastfeeding management. All lactation consultants are experienced in counseling, teaching and problem solving with latching or other breastfeeding issues for breastfeeding mothers.

    Awards & Recognition

    Level IV
    Maternity Center
    Designation from the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists
    for a comprehensive maternity center
    Level IV
    Neonatal Intensive Care Unit
    Designation from the American Academy of Pediatrics for providing
    the highest level of care for premature babies

    Baby-Friendly

    Baby-Friendly Birth Facility
    Designation from Baby-Friendly USA for providing an optimal level of care for breastfeeding mothers and their babies
    Center of Excellence Award Center of Excellence from Society for Obstetric Anesthesia and Perinatology (SOAP)
    Four-year designation recognizing excellence in obstetric anesthesia care
    Blue Distinction Center Blue Distinction Center for Maternity by Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield
    Designation for demonstrating expertise and commitment to quality care for vaginal and C-section deliveries
    Honor Roll Award Maternity Care Honor Roll from the California Health & Human Services Agency, Hospital Quality Institute, and CalHospital Compare - awarded for achieving the statewide C-section rate of 23.9% or lower for low-risk, first-birth deliveries
    CMQCC Excellence Award California Maternal Quality Care Collaborative Super Star & Early Implementers Awards - Awarded for submitting data for six consecutive months and high levels of engagement with the data center