Midwifery is the health science and health profession that deals with pregnancy, childbirth, and the postpartum period, in addition to the sexual and reproductive health of women throughout their lives. In many countries, midwifery is a medical profession. A professional in midwifery is known as a midwife.
Childbirth, also known as labour, parturition and delivery, is the completion of pregnancy where one or more babies exits the internal environment of the mother via vaginal delivery or caesarean section. In 2019, there were about 140.11 million human births globally. In the developed countries, most deliveries occur in hospitals, while in the developing countries most are home births.
All My Babies: A Midwife's Own Story is a 1953 educational film written, directed and produced by George C. Stoney which was used to educate midwives in the Southern United States and promote greater cooperation between midwifery and the modern health system. It was produced by the Georgia Department of Public Health. The film follows Mary Francis Hill Coley (1900–66) an African American midwife from Albany, Georgia who helped deliver over 3,000 babies in the middle part of the 20th century. On December 17, 2002, it was announced by Librarian of Congress James H. Billington that "All My Babies, George Stoney's landmark educational film used to educate midwives in Georgia and throughout the South" was among the annual selection of 25 motion pictures to be added to the National Film Registry.
A home birth is a birth that takes place in a residence rather than in a hospital or a birthing center. They may be attended by a midwife, or lay attendant with experience in managing home births. Home birth was, until the advent of modern medicine, the de facto method of delivery. The term was coined in the middle of the 19th century as births began to take place in hospitals.
Unassisted childbirth (UC) refers to the process of intentionally giving birth without the assistance of a medical birth attendant. It may also be known as freebirth, DIY (do-it-yourself) birth, unhindered birth, and unassisted home birth. Unassisted childbirth is by definition a planned process, and is thus distinct from unassisted birth due to reasons of emergency, lack of access to a skilled birth attendant, or other. It is also different from homebirth, although most UCs also happen within the home.
The Frontier Nursing Service (FNS) provides healthcare services to rural, underserved populations since 1925, and educates nurse-midwives since 1939.
Mary Carson Breckinridge was an American nurse midwife and the founder of the Frontier Nursing Service (FNS), which provided comprehensive family medical care to the mountain people of rural Kentucky. FNS served remote and impoverished areas off the road and rail system but accessible by horseback. She modeled her services on European practices and sought to professionalize American nurse-midwives to practice autonomously in homes and decentralized clinics. Although Breckinridge's work demonstrated efficacy by dramatically reducing infant and maternal mortality in Appalachia, at a comparatively low cost, her model of nurse-midwifery never took root in the United States.
A birth attendant, also known as skilled birth attendant, is a health professional who provides basic and emergency care to women and their newborns during pregnancy, childbirth and the postpartum period. A birth attendant, who may be a midwife, physician, obstetrician, or nurse, is trained to be present at ("attend") childbirth, whether the delivery takes place in a health care institution or at home, to recognize and respond appropriately to medical complications, and to implement interventions to help prevent them in the first place, including through prenatal care. Different birth attendants are able to provide different levels of care.
The Promotion of the Welfare and Hygiene of Maternity and Infancy Act, more commonly known as the Sheppard–Towner Act, was a 1921 U.S. Act of Congress that provided federal funding for maternity and childcare. It was sponsored by Senator Morris Sheppard (D) of Texas and Representative Horace Mann Towner (R) of Iowa and signed by President Warren G. Harding on November 23, 1921. It went out of effect in 1929.
Ruth Watson Lubic, CNM, EdD, FAAN, FACNM, is an American nurse-midwife and applied anthropologist who pioneered the role of nurse-midwives as primary care providers for women, particularly in maternity care. Lubic is considered to be one of the leaders of the nurse-midwifery movement in the United States.
In the United States, certified nurse midwives (CNMs) are advanced practice registered nurses in nurse midwifery, the nursing care of women during pregnancy and the postpartum period. CNMs are considered as midwives.
Obstetric medicine, similar to maternal medicine, is a sub-specialty of general internal medicine and obstetrics that specializes in process of prevention, diagnosing, and treating medical disorders in with pregnant women. It is closely related to the specialty of maternal-fetal medicine, although obstetric medicine does not directly care for the fetus. The practice of obstetric medicine, or previously known as "obstetric intervention," primarily consisted of the extraction of the baby during instances of duress, such as obstructed labor or if the baby was positioned in breech.
Midwives in the United States assist childbearing women during pregnancy, labor and birth, and the postpartum period. Some midwives also provide primary care for women including well-woman exams, health promotion, and disease prevention, family planning options, and care for common gynecological concerns. Before the turn of the 20th century, traditional midwives were informally trained and helped deliver almost all births. Today, midwives are professionals who must undergo formal training. Midwives in the United States formed the Midwifery Education, Regulation, and Association task force to establish a framework for midwifery.
Childbirth in Haiti follows a system of behavior determined by local beliefs, traditions and attitudes, and is also affected by economic conditions and limitations of available health care facilities.
Mary Francis Hill Coley was an American lay midwife who ran a successful business providing a range of birth services and who starred in a critically acclaimed documentary film used to train midwives and doctors. Her competence projected an image of black midwives as the face of an internationally esteemed medical profession, while working within the context of deep social and economic inequality in health care provided to African Americans. Her life story and work exist in the context of Southern granny midwives who served birthing women outside of hospitals.
A midwife is a health professional who cares for mothers and newborns around childbirth, a specialization known as midwifery.
Margaret Charles Smith was an African-American midwife, who became known for her extraordinary skill over a long career, spanning over thirty years. Despite working primarily in rural areas with women who were often in poor health, she lost very few of the more than 3000 babies she delivered, and none of the mothers in childbirth. In 1949, she became one of the first official midwives in Green County, Alabama, and she was still practicing in 1976, when the state passed a law outlawing traditional midwifery. In the 1990s, she cowrote a book about her career, Listen to Me Good: The Life Story of an Alabama Midwife, and in 2010 she was inducted into the Alabama Women's Hall of Fame.
This article provides a background on Nepal as a whole, with a focus on the nation's childbearing and birthing practices. While modern Western medicine has disseminated across the country to varying degrees, different regions in Nepal continue to practice obstetric and newborn care according to traditional beliefs, attitudes, and customs.
In its early history, Mexico was occupied by a large number of indigenous tribes such as the Mayans and Aztecs. In the 16th century, Spain colonized New Spain and took over the land from the indigenous peoples. Though it is now an independent nation, Mexico retains much of the cultural influence of Spain, including its official religion of Catholicism, the Spanish language, and the importance of machismo - the belief that men are superior to women. Mexico also retains much of the traditional beliefs of the indigenous peoples who first occupied the country. Besides Spanish, there are over one hundred different languages spoken in the country today. As a result, the current medical system involves a mix of traditional and Western medicinal techniques.
Childbirth in China is influenced by traditional Chinese medicine, state control of reproductive health and birthing, and the adoption of modern biomedical practices. There are an estimated 16 million births annually in mainland China. In 2019, the fertility rate was 1.696 births per woman.
