EAST Lancashire author and midwife Sheena Byrom will be the guest of honour at a prestigious film premiere in Burnley.

Microbirth, a film that examines the implications of changes in childbirth over the last 30 years, prem-ieres worldwide on Sept-ember 20 and Burnley doula and birth supporter Michelle Bromley has secured a screening for the town.

Sheena, from Whalley, is the former head of midwifery services for East Lancashire NHS Trust and author of Catching Babies and was awarded an OBE for service to midwifery in 2011.

She said: “This ground-breaking film offers an insight into the importance of childbirth, and the potential consequences of some of the current practices within maternity services worldwide. I can’t wait to see it and I would urge anyone with an interest in childbirth or health to join us for what promises to be a fantastic night.”

The film will be shown at Burnley Youth Theatre, starting at 6pm, and will raise funds for AIMS (The Association for Improve-ment in Maternity Serv-ices) and East Lancashire Positive Birth group.

Michelle, 29, a mum-of three and owner of Snowdrop Doula Comm-unity Interest Group in Burnley, said: “Medical advances mean the way women give birth has changed over the past 30 years and the film ques-tions whether these changes could have serious repercussions for the lifelong health of our children.

"It sounds far-fetched, but all the evidence shows that a lot goes on during birth that we don’t really understand, and interfering with the process could have a serious impact on our future.”

The British film has been crowd-funded from donat-ions around the world.

Featuring prominent scientists from the UK and North America, Microbirth examines how modern birth practices could be interfering with critical biological processes, pot-entially making our child-ren more susceptible to disease later in life.

According to the Birth Choices UK website in 2013, 27 per cent of births were by Caesarean section in Burnley.

Recent studies have sho-wn babies born by Cae-sarean section have approximately a 20 pre cent increased risk of develop-ing asthma or type 1 diabetes and a similar risk with obesity or gastro-intestinal conditions like Crohn’s disease.

There will be pie and peas supper, cake and a raffle.

For more information email contactmichelle@ snowdropdoula.co.uk.