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Springfield
As 2025 came to a close, Mercy’s labor and delivery team wasn’t just celebrating the start of a new year. They also rang in a new record for most babies born in a year. In 2025, Mercy welcomed 3,329, up more than 100 births over the previous record of 3,2226 births set in 2014.
“This reflects the trust our patients put in us,” said Brittany Shaar, Mercy’s nurse manager of labor and delivery. “We have our midwifery program, we offer low-intervention birthing rooms, and we were the first in the country to trial a new maternity mattress that improves a patient’s delivery experience. This new record for births is a result of our team’s hard work to help women have the delivery experience they want, and I’m incredibly proud to see their work pay off.”
To accommodate the nearly 300 babies born a month at Mercy, Shaar and her team made meaningful changes to operations. They increased staffing, gathered feedback from patients on ways to enhance their birthing experience and continued to strengthen the coordination needed among multiple teams before, during and after labor and delivery.
“Breaking this record was not easy,” Shaar said. “But these teams came together beautifully to meet the needs of our community. The results speak for themselves, and more women and families are choosing Mercy because we’re dedicated to helping mothers have the birthing experience they want. Whether they want a low-intervention birth, a natural birth or they don’t want to feel a thing, we are here to help them achieve that goal as much as we can.”
