I wish I had read this before choosing a practice. Given, I gave birth to a wonderful, healthy, baby - but the experience was awful. It did feel like a "baby factory" even with the choice of a midwife. In a nutshell: the triage waiting room had me wait on the FLOOR at 8 centimeters covered in meconium with a cup for vomit. They refused to give me a bed until I was processed.
That night, the midwife, Julie Omar, was juggling me and who knows how many other women. She would visit once every 1-2 hours for 10 minutes, look at the monitor, give some excuse and walk out. Finally, seven hours later, a doctor comes out of nowhere to tell me that I need a cesarean. Although this was a non-emergency cesarian (failure to progress) it all felt rushed from that point. My baby was born at 7:18 a.m. and the nightshift left at 8:00 a.m. Julie Omar never came in the recovery room and I never saw her again. It was a system.
The prenatal care was different and more attentive. However, I also had different midwives. The actual labor is a huge part of the experience and how I was treated was a great disappointment.
Also, as I'm one for statistics. As of 2009, the rate of epidurals at Northwestern (including the midwife practice) is 98% and the rate of cesarians is 29%. These statistics are taken from a prenatal class/lecture at Northwestern.