2. What Do MidWives Do?
Description
This article is from the Midwifery FAQ, by cnmpat@aol.com (Pat Sonnenstuhl) with numerous contributions by others.
2. What Do MidWives Do?
Midwives teach, educate and empower women to take control of their own
health care. In most communities, they provide prenatal care, or
supervision of the pregnancy, and then assist the mother to give birth.
They manage the birth, and guard the woman and her newborn in the
postpartum period.
Most midwives encourage and monitor women throughout their labor with
techniques to improve the labor and birth. Reassurance, positive imaging
and suggestions to change positions and walk helps labors progress. Many
midwives provide family planning services and routine women's health
examinations such as pap smears and physical examinations.
They teach women about sexually transmitted infections, and focus on
prevention of the spread of infections. What specifically midwives do
will depend upon: her training, her licensure, and what is allowed in
the state, province, or country in which she practices.
For example, in the United States some midwives can prescribe
medications, provide women's health care throughout the menopause years.
Midwives worldwide attend births in the home, hospital or birthing
center, depending upon their education and licensure, and the rules
governing their practice.
Midwives believe it is especially important to provide time for
questions, teaching, and time to listen to the concerns and needs of the
women they care for.
The WHO definition of the midwife gives us the following guidelines
about what midwives do:
She must be able to give the necessary supervision, care and advice to
women during pregnancy, labour and the postpartum period, to conduct
deliveries on her own responsibility and to care for the newborn and the
infant. This care includes preventative measures, the detection of
abnormal conditions in mother and child, the procurement of medical
assistance and the execution of emergency measures in the absence of
medical help. She has an important task in health counseling and
education, not only for the woman, but also within the family and the
community. The work should involve antenatal education and preparation
for parenthood and extends to certain areas of gynecology, family
planning and child care. She may practice in hospitals, clinics, health
units, domiciliary conditions of in any other service.
(WHO, FIGO, ICM Statement).
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