Cheers to those special deliveries
Midwives should be celebrated on International Day
Midwifery is more than delivering babies — it focuses on “the first 1000 days of life”. The role of a midwife includes prescribing, ordering and interpreting blood tests and scans and managing any emergencies that might pop up.
Hawke’s Bay District Health Board acting director of midwifery Catherine Overfield said May 5, International Day of the Midwife, was a chance to acknowledge and thank all midwives in the region.
A midwife’s practice places them in an ideal position to positively impact health and wellbeing in “the first 1000 days of life”, Overfield said.
Fifty hospital midwives are employed by the DHB, and there are many self-employed midwives known as Lead Maternity Carers (LMCs) within Hawke’s Bay’s community settings.
Overfield said DHB midwives and LMCs work closely together, sharing meetings twice a month where they can provide support and knowledge sharing for each other.
The meetings enable midwives to support each other through caring for women with complex pregnancies and births within the hospital environment.
“This teamwork made all the difference through the recent challenges of Covid where space and resources were limited,” said Overfield.
Although DHB and LMC midwives may be on different paths, they come together in many ways.
Hawke’s Bay LMC Kiley Clark is a self-employed midwife who has had experience working at the DHB and in Hawke’s Bay community.
Clark is one of three midwives who broke new ground in March when they started a Hawke’s Bay midwifery practice, Tapuhi Kura, reintegrating Māori cultural practices into daily care.
Last year, she covered a maternity leave placement at the Hawke’s Bay District Health Board as a Māori midwifery consultant.
With the help of her DHB leadership, she built rapport and networks with other Māori midwives, including Charlene Eparaima and Crissy Coromandel, and together they started Tapuhi Kura.
“Our main priority at Tapuhi Kura is caring for our whānau Māori, and trying to readjust some of the statistics and inequities that exist,” Clark said.
“Rightfully or wrongfully, they are definitely there, and Māori are trying to work in a system that wasn’t designed for us.”
Clark believes developing a community of Māori midwives is essential to tackle inequities.
“If we have a dedicated community of Māori midwives we will encourage others to step into that space.
“The DHB is great for camaraderie within the hospital, to upskill and build relationships with colleagues, and also for family circumstances. I like that in a DHB you can really upskill yourself and you’re not on call, whereas as an LMC you’re serving your community and can build strong relationships with māmā and whānau.”
HB-DHB clinical midwifery coordinator Vanessa Bryant said she loves the variety of working in the maternity ward of the Hawke’s Bay Fallen Soldiers’ Memorial Hospital.
Bryant joined the DHB as a trainee in 2014 and became fully employed in 2017.
“A normal work day here is hectic,” she said. “This phone could ring any moment saying, ‘I’m coming in for a reduced foetal movements review’, or someone could be bleeding,” she said. “It’s very much an ED system.”
Born and bred in Hawke’s Bay, Bryant enrolled in the EIT health sciences foundation course in 2013, becoming the first in her family to undertake tertiary studies.
Bryant says the Ministry of Health’s Voluntary Bonding Scheme (VBS) was a huge financial help.
The VBS funds up to $3500 per year for five years for midwives who work in hard-to-staff areas such as Hawke’s Bay.
“You have to do three years before you qualify for your first payment, which helps pay off your student loan. The bonding was a blessing,” she said.
Seeing families created is a highlight of the job, she says.
“That first initial two minutes after the birth when people are like ‘Holy moley I did it!’ — that’s pretty cool.”