Hi everyone, I am a midwife writing from Ceduna SA. 12 months ago our obstetric service was suspended due to lack of qualified GP's. We now have the GP's with obstetrics and anaesthetics, but our biggest problem now is a limited number of midwives. We only have 4 midwives, which is soon to be reduced to 3 as I am heading off on maternity leave!!! Of these 3 only 2 are in town at the moment, one living 70k's out of town. Our hospital board and management are VERY keen to get the service up and running again asap. We have been given some money to investigate different models of care that might suit our unique situation. We have supportive medical staff as well. I was wondering if there is anyone out there that might have some ideas or suggestions or similar experiences that might help us towards finding a way to bring a midwifery service back to our community. We would be looking at about 30 deliveries a year, and probably to start with, only multis simply because their labours are generally shorter and we don't have the staff to 'hand over' to at the end of 12 hours.
Any help would be welcome. I will look forward to hearing from someone soon!! Cheers, Josie Greaves -- This mailing list is sponsored by ACE Graphics. Visit <http://www.acegraphics.com.au> to subscribe or unsubscribe.
