Midwives, whether they work in hospitals or out there in the community, went into their career to look after women and their new born babies from conception to childbirth. However, as with many professions, they have been faced with too much administration –filling in forms etc.
Well, now there has never been a better time to enter the profession of Midwifery because the Government has recently set aside £140m to enable nurses and midwives within the NHS to improve care by reducing bureaucracy and spending more time with patients instead of having to deal with mountains of paper work.
From the above sum, £100m will be made available to nurses and midwives to purchase suitable items of technology such as handheld mobile devices that will enable them to, for instance, quickly access a patient’s medical records from any location thus speedily providing them with the information required to better understand a patient’s condition and provide appropriate treatment.
However, a midwife’s role goes much further than just delivering babies. They provide support and advise both physically, psychologically and emotionally to women and their families from antenatal to post natal care.
From the very first meeting with the expectant mother the midwife will build a relationship with her dealing with any concerns that the mother may have with regards to the pregnancy or advising her where she may get help with items that might be troubling her such as housing, relationships etc. The new technology will assist the midwife in this respect.
The Government has also confirmed that it will be releasing £40m to provide more leadership training of nurses and midwives. This year alone as many as 1,000 midwives and nurses will be trained in this way with up to 10,000 benefiting from this further leadership training during the next two years.
This can only be good for the profession, as more training encourages midwifes to stay in their chosen profession and further their careers.
So, if you are going to be new to the NHS and are considering a career in Midwifery, the route to becoming a Registered Midwife is to attend a Higher Education Institution (HEI) to complete a Midwifery degree such as http://www.mdx.ac.uk/courses/undergraduate/nursing/index.aspxthat takes 3 years to complete.
For those that are already Registered Nurses, there is a shorter Bachelor of Sciences degree course lasting 18 months at the end of which they will become a Registered Midwife.
