Chile hospital integrates Native medicine, birth to death


              Pamela Vergara and son Julian Lagos Vergara sit with Mapuche cultural liaison Cristina Aron next to a tree that was planted over the placenta from Julian´s birth in Osorno, Chile, Sunday, Aug. 21, 2022. Chilean law now requires hospitals to give placentas to mothers if requested. (AP Photo/Luis Hidalgo)
            
              Pamela Vergara poses for a photo next to a tree that was planted over the placenta of her son Julian in the yard of her home in Osorno, Chile, Sunday, Aug. 21, 2022. Mapuche people see the placenta as holding a twin spirit to the child’s. Its burial, often with a tree planted on top to grow as the newborn does, is believed to create a lifelong connection between children and the natural elements of their family’s territory. (AP Photo/Luis Hidalgo)
            
              Cristina Aron, a Mapuche cultural liaison, poses for a photo in the kitchen of her home in Osorno, Chile, Sunday, Aug. 21, 2022. “Childbirth is a spiritual energy event for the mother, the baby and the community,” Aron says. (AP Photo/Luis Hidalgo)
            
              Cristina Aron prepares a birthing room that she built in the backyard of her home in Osorno, Chile, Sunday, Aug. 21, 2022. Aron has served as a cultural liaison for two dozen women from pregnancy into early motherhood. (AP Photo/Luis Hidalgo)
            
              Irma Rohe Cardenas, a Mapuche midwife, poses for a photo at her home in Osorno, Chile, Sunday, Aug. 21, 2022. Rohe first assisted a birth in the hospital’s delivery room five years ago. (AP Photo/Luis Hidalgo)
            
              Ingrid Naipallan, a Mapuche machi, or spiritual guide, embraces Cristian Fernandez Ancapan after the birth of his son at the San Jose de Osorno Base Hospital in Osorno, Chile, Saturday, Aug. 20, 2022. Machis are predominantly women who enter into altered states of consciousness to contact spirits for healing and also mediate and negotiate between different cultural realities. (AP Photo/Luis Hidalgo)
            
              A midwife tends to Angela Quintana Aucapan and her newborn son, Namunkura, at the San Jose de Osorno Base Hospital in Osorno, Chile, Saturday, Aug. 20, 2022. Reclaiming ancestral practices is what drew Quintana Aucapan to have her baby in the special delivery room recently. (AP Photo/Luis Hidalgo)
            
              Angela Quintana Aucapan holds her newborn son, Namunkura, at the San Jose de Osorno Base Hospital in Osorno, Chile, Saturday, Aug. 20, 2022. “I was able to do it as my ancestors did,” she says. “With a ceremony while we waited for the new addition to the family, I felt supported as I received my baby.” (AP Photo/Luis Hidalgo)
            
              View of the San Jose de Osorno Base Hospital in Osorno, Chile, Sunday, Aug. 21, 2022. The largest public hospital in the southern Chilean city of Osorno is finding new ways to incorporate Indigenous health care practices. (AP Photo/Luis Hidalgo)
            
              Namunkura Fernandez Aucapan is taken by a nurse to be tested after being born at the San Jose de Osorno Base Hospital in Osorno, Chile, Saturday, Aug. 20, 2022. The largest public hospital in Osorno is finding new ways to incorporate Indigenous health care practices, such as having a machi, or Mapuche spiritual guide, help with delivery. (AP Photo/Luis Hidalgo)
            
              A midwife, left, tends to Angela Quintana Aucapan and her newborn son, Namunkura, as the child’s father, Cristian Fernandez Ancapan, and Ingrid Naipallan, a machi, or spiritual guide, accompany them at the San Jose de Osorno Base Hospital in Osorno, Chile, Saturday, Aug. 20, 2022. The largest public hospital in Osorno is finding new ways to incorporate Indigenous health care practices, such as having a machi help with delivery. (AP Photo/Luis Hidalgo)
            
              A midwife tends to Angela Quintana Aucapan and her newborn son, Namunkura, as the child’s father, Cristian Fernandez Ancapan, and Ingrid Naipallan, a machi, or spiritual guide, assist at the San Jose de Osorno Base Hospital in Osorno, Chile, Saturday, Aug. 20, 2022. Reclaiming ancestral practices is what drew Quintana Aucapan to have her baby in the special delivery room. (AP Photo/Luis Hidalgo)
            
              A sign that reads in Spanish “Angela Quintana Aucapan. 38 weeks pregnant. Covid negative. Intercultural birth.” is posted on the door of Angela Quintana Aucapan´s room as she settles in to give birth at the San Jose de Osorno Base Hospital in Osorno, Chile, Friday, Aug. 19, 2022. About 20 of the hospital’s 1,500 births each year are intercultural deliveries. (AP Photo/Luis Hidalgo)
            
              Ana Maria Aucapan, left, a Mapuche machi, or spiritual guide, and Ingrid Naipallan, second left, perform Indigenous rites with a percussion instrument called a kultrun as Angela Quintana Aucapan begins her labor accompanied by her partner Cristian Fernandez Ancapan at the San Jose de Osorno Base Hospital in Osorno, Chile, Friday, Aug. 19, 2022. The largest public hospital in Osorno is finding new ways to incorporate Indigenous health care practices, such as having a machi help with delivery. (AP Photo/Luis Hidalgo)
            
              Angela Quintana Aucapan and her partner Cristian Fernandez Ancapan look at their newborn son, whom they named Namunkura, at the San Jose de Osorno Base Hospital in Osorno, Chile, Saturday, Aug. 20, 2022. Namunkura was born in a special delivery room with Native images on the walls and bed, an effort by the hospital to validate the cultural practices of Chile’s Indigenous groups. (AP Photo/Luis Hidalgo)
Chile hospital integrates Native medicine, birth to death