Elisabeth Bing who popularised the natural childbirth techniques of French doctor Fernand Lamaze has died in New York at the age of 100.

A woman who popularised the Lamaze method of childbirth and helped change the way women and doctors approached the delivery room, has died at her home in New York.

Lamaze International says Elisabeth Bing died on Friday at the age of 100.

Bing became interested in childbirth techniques in the 1950s.

At the time, labouring women were often heavily medicated, fathers generally were nowhere to be seen and expectant parents commonly had far less information than today.

Bing and the late Marjorie Karmel helped change all that, drawing on methods that Dr Fernand Lamaze had spread in France.

The two women founded what's now Lamaze International to teach breathing and relaxation strategies for what became known as natural childbirth.