Doctors perform cesarean sections more frequently at Long Island hospitals than at counterparts elsewhere in New York, even though the surgery poses greater risks to mothers than vaginal births, a Newsday analysis found.

The 13 Nassau and Suffolk hospitals with maternity departments vary greatly in how often physicians use the procedure, a major surgery in which incisions are made in the abdomen and uterus to deliver the baby. The 48.5% of "low-risk" pregnancies at Port Jefferson's St. Charles Hospital that resulted in cesareans in 2024 — the highest rate in New York — were more than double the 20.7% at Long Island Jewish Medical Center in New Hyde Park, which had the region's lowest rate, according to data from The Leapfrog Group, a nonprofit that evaluates hospital safety and quality.

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