Today, the report "Listening to Mothers III: Pregnancy and Birth" was released. I saw that the data suggested that the highest percentage of cesareans came from the induction group. Their chart is below:

I looked at my own data from the past 12 months (N=30) for first-time mothers at term who experienced labour (no second births, scheduled cesareans for placenta previa, or premature births, etc.) Of the 87% of clients who went into spontaneous labour (did not have an induction) there were NO cesareans. Of the 13% of clients who had inductions, 100% of them had epidurals and 50% of those women had cesareans. Overall, of the 30 clients who fit the criteria (two were at home), the epidural rate was 40% and the overall cesarean rate was 13%. The numbers are small, but they still closely mirror the large study. Interesting stuff.