The gentlebirth.org website is provided courtesy of
Ronnie Falcao, LM MS, a homebirth midwife in Mountain View, CA

How to Advocate for Midwifery

A new midwifery task force has formed in Prince George, BC. I am not a midwife, though when my education is complete I hope to be. As a member of the MTF, I have been asked to write an article for the "Caring" column in our city newspaper.

I would be very interested to hear what you think would be important to tell the public about midwifery. This is quite a large forum (gulp) of 75,000 people + lots of regional folk - and basically it will be an intro to a number articles on midwifery with which we hope to raise awareness, explode some myths, and do some educating...

I will include some things like: continuity of care (prenatal, intranatal, postpartum), birth sites, well woman care, cost effectiveness...

We may be able to run a number of columns...

What do you think?

Michelle J. Yeager                      
        Nursing & Psychology
                University of Northern British Columbia 
                        3333 University Way
                                Prince George  BC  CANADA V2N 4Z9
                                        (604) 960-6666 Phone
                                                (604) 960-5744 FAX
                                                        yeager@unbc.edu

I think it would be important to address safety up front so people can listen to the rest of it. At one FP conference I attended, the medical director of the Monroe Maternity Center in Tennessee gave a presentation. Her first slide demonstrated that the perinatal mortality rate had fallen for the counties they served after opening the maternity center. It was so refreshing to have that out front. There was NOT A SINGLE QUESTION about safety--the first time I have been in a group of physicians discussing OOH birth without this long, agonizing debate about safety. If there was some way for you to intro your piece with something like this, it could really help open minds.

Then, I think it is important to focus on the human aspect of the birthing, perhaps with a birth story describing how a family gives birth with a midwife. It is also VERY important to avoid criticizing other providers of care. All who provide maternity care want to believe that they are doing a great job. If you trash doctors and hospitals, you will get a backlash. (And not all doctors and hospitals are horrible)

It is also, I think, helpful for the public to understand that midwifery care is for healthy women, but that midwives can often co-manage complicated pregnancies. I like the saying that "When it is time for aggressive medical care, it is also time for aggressive midwifery care" That is, it is the family with the difficult pregnancy that most needs the emotional support, processing, nutritional education, problem solving, etc that a midwife can provide.