Midwifery Online Course(s) & Continuing Education

Beneath the surface of every labor and delivery room interaction between physicians, nurses, and patients (as well as their partners) vibrate the pressures of power. Who is in charge? Regardless of the stated beliefs or legal truth about who IS in charge, the dance between the characters in the labor room often plays out archetypally. Archetypes are a recurrent symbol or motif found in literature, art, or mythology that live within the unconscious influencing how individuals behave, think, and feel. While many archetypal energies are possible during labor, the dominant archetypal energies active in a labor room tend to vacillate between that of Caretaker, Orphan, Ruler, Hero, Innocent, and Warrior. Nurses, often drawn to the career to help others, connect with the Caretaker archetype. However, due in part to hierarchical structures within the hospital setting, nurses can be left feeling unseen, undervalued, or powerless activating the Orphan archetype. Comparable patterns can be observed in obstetricians with the Ruler and Hero and in parents with the Innocent and Warrior archetypes. Without consciousness of the power dynamics between these archetypal energies, satisfaction in both the process and outcome is often fleeting for parents and can lead to burnout in professionals. Greater understanding of the needs of each activated archetype provides individuals needed guidance in how to better navigate labor room power dynamics and why doing so matters profoundly.

Over the past years, Tijuana, Mexico, has seen an influx of U.S.-bound refugees and migrants, many of whom have escaped incredibly difficult situations in their country of origin. With no or little access to healthcare, pregnant women and girls are often most vulnerable. Parteras Fronterizas / Borderland Midwives caters to the unique needs of this underserved patient population by utilizing a holistic approach that combines midwifery, traditional and Western medical practices.

This presentation explores the unique challenges pregnant migrants and refugees face at the US/Mexico border. It highlights the importance of the midwifery model of care and dives into how midwives and healthcare providers can provide compassionate, trauma informed and comprehensive care despite difficult and limiting circumstances. The presentation will also discuss global health and midwifery skills that can help dismantle health disparities.

Working in perinatal care can be deeply rewarding. It can also lead to job-related burnout and secondary traumatic stress. Secondary traumatic stress, or compassion fatigue, can occur when witnessing traumatic events in the workplace. This can occur when witnessing infant death or traumatic births, or when there is too much work, or work that doesn’t seem to make a difference, and little institutional support. A recent survey by AWHONN of 464 Labor & Delivery nurses found that more than a third reported moderate-to-severe symptoms of traumatic stress as a result of incidents they encountered on the job. This has serious implications for both patients and providers. Burnout and Compassion fatigue/secondary traumatic stress can lead to physical and mental health sequelae for professionals who experience them. It can also have a negative impact on the care provided. Self-care is essential for being able to provide care to others. In this seminar, participants will learn about the causes and consequences of both burnout and secondary traumatic stress/compassion fatigue. The good news is that there is hope for recovery. Participants will learn some specific strategies for integrating self-care into their care for others.

Working in perinatal care can be deeply rewarding. It can also lead to job-related burnout, secondary traumatic stress, and moral injury. Secondary traumatic stress (compassion fatigue), or moral injury, can occur when witnessing traumatic events in the workplace. This can occur when witnessing infant death or traumatic births, or when there is too much work, or work that doesn’t seem to make a difference, and little institutional support. Unfortunately, this is remarkably common among caregivers for perinatal women. Burnout, compassion fatigue, and moral injury can lead to physical and mental health sequelae for care providers and have a negative effect on the care they provider. Self-care is essential for being able to provide care to others. In this presentation, participants will learn about the causes and consequences of burnout, compassion fatigue, and moral injury. Fortunately, there is hope for recovery. Participants will learn some specific strategies for integrating self-care into their care for others.

The rapid development and attempts at standardization and professionalization of the modern version of midwifery in the U.S. has created debate and tension about what, exactly, should be contained within the internationally recommended 3-year midwife training. Competencies in clinical judgment, intuition, multi-tasking, delegating, and other higher-order professional skills, hallmarks of modern midwifery, take longer to develop than just technical excellence. Midwives in my parts of the world are targeted during and after providing care by the dominate for-profit medical model. However, despite all this, charting defensively is not an integral part of midwifery training across the globe, most charting is not standardized therefore putting midwives at risk. Thus, increasing malpractice costs, and decreasing access to midwives is the result. Not having a context for charting, makes midwives vulnerable to litigation. Not good for the midwife, not good for the community. This presentation about defensive charting aims to bridge the gap by starting a conversation around honing critical thinking pathways, sharpening charting skills and debunking charting myths, optimizing charting habits, shared decision-making and tips to protect yourself during and after poor outcomes. Access the tools to close existing gaps in charting, acknowledge cultural incompetency, political reality, and design in-office systems of strength and confidence for the future.

Childbirth educators are often challenged to find ways to meet the needs of LGBTQ families in the classroom. This presentation offers an in-depth understanding of what is required to truly hold space for LGBTQ families. Concepts of sexual orientation and gender identity are explained in relation to the transformative experience of becoming a parent. A detailed outline is provided for protecting LGBTQ families against marginalization in the classroom, from advertising and communication with class participants to course materials and the physical classroom space. An exploration of gender inclusive language is included, so that childbirth educators can uniformly discuss pregnancy, birth and infant feeding in ways that are inclusive of new parents of all genders, orientations and family structures. For those who wish to teach specialized classes for LGBTQ families, additional aspects that arise in an exclusive space will be presented.

Barriers to accessible, affordable and respectful midwifery practice exist in every country. These barriers inevitably reduce the ability for midwives to provide their full scope of care and can impact the scaling up or sustainability of the workforce. Barriers range from pay inequity to lack of recognition, to regulatory practice barriers and poor reimbursement for services. Regardless of the contributing barrier, there are fundamental steps that can be strategically planned to advance change. Although midwives may lead the call for change, purposeful planning is the focus of this presentation. Have you documented a current, compelling story about why – what is the issue and why is it important? What barriers are the most pressing, and, what can you bring forward as a proposed solution? Who are your supporters on the side that perhaps should be promoted as front and center advocates? Do you know how to organize an effective public advocacy movement? Are you skilled in the art of negotiation – getting everyone to YES? This presentation aims to guide midwives to critically evaluate the process of self-preparedness in order to scale up and sustain the profession. Information to "midwife the midwife" beyond clinical expertise toward a voice and champion for change.

The role of nurses has often been dictated by those outside the profession. First, we were seen as doctors' handmaidens, which informed a collective consciousness that we were only valuable in support of paternalistic healthcare. As the role of nurses expanded, the public came to recognize our unique skills, identified us as the most trustworthy profession over two decades, and labeled us heroes. In response, we have positioned ourselves as a neutral identity that is "just there to help." However, this helper or savior identity has several negative ramifications including a preoccupation with how our care might be judged in the event of an unexpected outcome, which ultimately creates a divide between us & those in our care. Nurses benefit from identification of and reflection on their motivation for pursuing nursing, their current care practices, and how they can shift their mindset to release the rigidity, guilt, and fear that is associated with saviorism. We cannot allow patterns of saviorism to continue to dominate our profession. The health of our patients & ourselves depends on us stepping away from "helping" and into a standard of trauma-informed advocacy.

In this session, we'll explore a deeper understanding of what obstetric violence is and the many ways it manifests to undermine and harm birthing people—as well as puts their caregivers and support teams in compromising positions. We'll discuss how birth professionals can avoid committing or contributing to obstetric violence themselves and how they can help make trauma informed care--including self-healing--the industry standard.

Are women forced into cesarean surgery? How is this possible? When does it happen? Why does it occur? And what do forced/coerced cesareans really look like? This session will explore the extreme disconnect between medical evidence, national guidelines, ethical responsibilities and the current maternity care system. We will focus on the role of hospital “VBAC bans” which restrict access to vaginal birth after cesarean and mandate repeat cesarean as well as the public health fallout of such policies. We will review how forced cesareans can occur in the face of national guidelines that denounce them while professional ethics simultaneously affirm and honor the autonomy of the pregnant person. Finally we will close with how we can turn the tide, create change, and improve the care our clients and children will ultimately receive.