Hi all ozmidders,
I have pasted below a copy of a letter sent to the editor of the Canberra Times in response to the article 'Obstetrician fed up with the hostility' (CT 12/01/02) sent on behalf of members of the Australian Bachelor of Midwifery Student Collective.
Yours in birth,
Tina Pettigrew
Birthworks
Independent CBE and aspiring B.Mid Midwife.
Convenor, Aust B. Mid Student Collective.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/BMidStudentCollective
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
" As we trust the flowers to open to new life
- So we can trust birth"
Harriette Hartigan.
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Tuesday 15th January 2002
To the Editor, CT.
Dear Sir,
We write in response to the recent article 'Obstetrician fed up with the
hostility' (CT 12/0102) in which retiring Canberra Obstetrician and Chair of
the ACT Medical Board, Dr. Heather Munro, states she has 'reservations' about
'new procedures' which would allow people to study midwifery without having
first completed a nursing qualification.
Dr. Munro's suggestion that, prospective graduates of a 3 year undergraduate
midwifery education program, (Bachelor of Midwifery), will be under-skilled
and need nursing in order to detect and recognise sickness and illhealth in
pregnant and birthing women, is totally unfounded and demonstrates a gross
misunderstanding of the actuality of what constitutes Bachelor of Midwifery
(B Mid) Education.
As aspiring B Mid midwives, we strongly object to Dr Munro's inference that
as B Mid graduates, we will somehow be deficient in certain aspects of our
knowledge and skills because we are not nurses !!! Midwives who are graduates
of B Mid programs are specialised in all aspects of normal pregnancy and
childbirth. The programs encompass a huge body of knowledge, drawing on the
history, art and science of midwifery; the biosciences, behavioural sciences,
nursing and medical sciences, pharmacology just to name a few. Graduates
possess excellent skills and knowledge in detecting the abnormal and then
referring to and working within a collaborative relationship with other
members of the healthcare team, in partnership with women, to ensure best
outcomes for the woman involved.
The United Kingdom and New Zealand has for many years now prepared the
majority of their midwives via three and four year midwifery education
programs. Other industrialised countries such as the Netherlands, France,
Demark, Germany and Sweden, have always educated their midwives 'directly'
and as opposed to 'indirectly' via nursing and boast the highest of practice
standards and report some of the lowest clinical outcomes in terms of
maternal and perinatal mortality and morbidity in the world. Moreover,
evaluations of these comprehensive three and four year midwifery programs
shows that B Mid graduates are confident and competent midwives and when
compared with their nurse-midwife peers educated via post-registration
(nursing) programs, posses similar academic and practice performance and
standards.
Research into the contemporary issues facing midwifery in Australia today,
further affirms these studies, with anecdotal reports of that in New Zealand,
'all one-year post-registration (nursing) programs have now ceased', in
favour of the undergraduate three year, Bachelor of Midwifery education
programs. What needs highlighting here is it was nurses themselves who
considered that their one-year program was inadequate in comparison to the
three-year midwifery program and thus initiated this action !!
Midwifery education up until this year in Australia, has required that
aspiring midwives have a nursing qualification (three year undergraduate
nursing degree or its equivalent) and a one year post registration practice
prerequisite. These requirements have persisted inspite of it having long
been recognised that midwifery education in Australia does not meet
recognised international competency standards for midwives or even the
nationally agreed baselines of competency as specifically developed by our
own midwifery profession. Therefore, the rationale for the introduction of B
Mid programs into Australia, while multifactorial, it is predominantly due to
an acknowledgment by the midwifery profession, that it has a clear
responsibility to ensure that midwifery education in Australia, reflects
world-wide and current midwifery knowledge and that the midwifery graduate
has the knowledge, skills and competency to provide woman centred care
throughout the whole of the pregnancy-childbirth continuum as in accordance
with the internationally recognised and ratified 'Definition of a Midwife'.
The decision to introduce B Mid education into the Australian context, is
thus informed by compelling evidence from countries overseas whose midwives
are educationally prepared via three and four year 'direct entry' midwifery
programs. Evidence which now demands a change to the way in which midwives
here in Australia are prepared to practice. Therefore, as Members of the
Bachelor of Midwifery Student Collective, we implore those who share Dr.
Munro's sentiments and do not support the introduction of B Mid education
programs, to please educate themselves and others as to the actuality of the
B Mid so as to not perpetuate such myths, and to contribute to open, honest
and constructive dialogue, in a spirit of discovery, sensitivity and respect,
for the benefit of all concerned.
Yours sincerely,
Members, Australian Bachelor of Midwifery Student Collective.
