Saturday, January 30, 2010

Meet the executive members of the WA Branch 2010




Tracy Martin has many roles of which one is President of the WA Branch. She is a midwife with over 15 yrs experience in maternity care having recently worked in antenatal care. She is also a member of the Professional Practice Committee at the NMBWA.





Abbey works with women and their families planning to birth at home.
Encouraging, facilitating and supporting women to make choices for themselves and their babies that inspire their culture, their mind and their heart is what moves me to the core. Strong competent human beings rise from such a basic evolutionary process if guarded and treated with the respect birth deserves. Most of the time all we as midwives need to do is be there and believe in her.
Abbey is the Vice President of the College.



Jill Banks became a midwife in Portsmouth UK, since coming to Australia Jill has worked mainly in country areas and is well versed with the issues country midwives encounter. Jill now works in a small metro hospital as a midwifery manager. Jill is the Fundraising and Publicity Officer.





Karen Kruit is the Aboriginal Liaison: a midwife with a passion for holistic maternity care for all women. As a midwifery consultant for Aboriginal Maternity Care, I am pleased to note the intention of the college to expand their support for midwives working in rural and remote health services. This will help to strenghten the professional identity in their local communities and inform women about the benefits of having midwifery led maternity care.


Shelley Gower is the Consumer Representative. Shelley has been involved in maternity related community organisations since 2004. She was Convener of Birthrites: Healing After Cesarean for 2 years and served on the Board of Community Midwifery WA for 18 months. She has recently worked as Project Coordinator for the Curtin University School of Nursing and Midwifery on a NHMRC funded project on women's experienced of pregnancy and childbirth.


Janice Butt has a joint appointment as Coordinator of Midwifdery Education at KEMH and Associate Director of Midwifery at Curtin University. Janice is passionate about the profession of midwifery and is dedicated to the development of midwifery as a independent profession working in collaboration with its medical partners. Janice is a fellow of the ACM and is also currently one of the midwife members on the WA Nurses and Midwives Board. Janice is the Midwifery Education Standards Advisory Committee (MESAC) Representative.


Pauline Costins is the National Director Representative for WA. Pauline is passionate about giving women informed choice about pregnancy and birth options. She is also passionate about passing on information to midwives about their legal, ethical and professional frameworks, her special interests are law and ethics. Pauline is a lecturer at Curtin University in the School of Nursing and Midwifery and also works one day a week clinically and a member of the Network Advisory Committee at the NMBWA.


Terri Barrett is the BHFI representative: Terri is also the Midwifery Director of Statewide Obstetric Support Unit; this unit provides operational support to public maternity services across WA.







Susan Cudlipp is the Community Midwifery Representative: she is a midwife working for CMP and has served on the CMWA Board for 2 years. Susan also has experience of working in Family Birth Centres. She is passionate about women's choices about where and with whom they birth with particularly Homebirth and midwifery led care.




Dr Ravani Chetty is the Education Officer, she is a senior lecturer in the School of Nursing and Midwifery at Curtin University. She has taught midwifery in South Africa and United Arab Emirates. Ravani also has a joint appointment with Joondulup Health Campus as a midwife-nurse research consultant. Her research focus is adolescent maternity care.


Pauline Moore is a member of the education committee. She is passionate about midwifery and providing women informed choice. Pauline currently works in the Next Birth After Caesarean Section Clinic (NBAC) which assists women to have choice about their next birth after a caesarean section.





Sylvia Jenkin is a member of the education committee. Sylvia is a direct entry midwife from Germany, who has worked in Germany, NZ and now Perth. She is passionate about midwifery, homebirth, waterbirth and providing continuity of care for women. She currently works as a casual midwife who particularly enjoys working in the Family Birth Centre.





Trish Dempsey: Minute secretary: Trish is a midwifery educator at KEMH and holds an adjunct appointment with Curtin University. Trish has worked in all areas of practice including neonatal intensive care. She coordinates the midwifery return to practice programs and neonatal resuscitation assessors program. She is also a member of the Education and Research Advisory Committee and Network Advisory Committee at the NMBWA.


Meet our general secretary Laura Robertson- who is a rotational midwife working across nearly every aspect of midwifery practice. Laura is passionate about working with women to make the most of their childbirth experience,and about working with midwives to make their work fulfilling, ie.offering women a wider choice of place of birth would lead to midwives practicing across the full scope of midwifery practice. Laura is also passionate about midwives maintaining traditional skills through everyday use - a challenge.



'Birth is not only about making babies. It's about making
mothers -strong, competent, capable mothers who trust themselves and believe
in their inner strength." - Barbara Katz Rothman









Friday, January 29, 2010

Capers bookstores presents: Midwifery update workshops


NEW Midwifery Update workshops in Perth April 19-20. We'd appreciate if you could pass this information on to interested colleagues, as bringing these workshops to Perth does incur additional time and expense so we do appreciate help in promoting them.

Student discounts of $25/day are available, for those not working as health professionals at the time. To claim just make a note when ordering, and you will be required to sign a declaration on the day.

Shea Caplice and Sheryl Sidery will present two one-day Midwifery Update workshops: Using Water for Labour and Birth & Essential Midwifery Skills for Challenging Situations in Perth 19-10 April.

Shea Caplice has been a practising midwife for 27 years in a variety of midwifery models. She was Project Coordinator for the first publicly funded Homebirth service in NSW, and is currently the Coordinator of the Royal Hospital for Women Malabar Community Midwifery Link Service, a service with a particular focus on Aboriginal families.Shea produced the film, The Art of Birth: Four Beautiful Births in Water, and has used her experience with waterbirth in training other midwives on many occasions, and co-writing the chapter on waterbirth in Midwifery: Preparation for Practice (Pairman et al). Sheryl Sidery has been practising midwifery for 24 years both in private practice and in the public system. For the past 5 years Sheryl’s work has focused on how we parent and how women’s past and present experiences can shape her mothering. She is currently the Midwifery Consultant for Perinatal Mental Health and combines this with her private homebirth practice.

Kind Regards,
Sarah
CAPERS Bookstore
PO Box 387
Yarraville VIC 3013
Ph 03 9318 0151 Fax 03 9318 0158
office@capersbookstore.com.au









Monday, January 25, 2010

Meeting the Prime Minister: Australia Day Celebrations in Perth


The President (Tracy Martin) of the Australian College of Midwives WA Branch & guest (Pauline Costins) National Director representative WA Branch was invited to the Australia Day Celebrations at the Town Hall on Thursday 21st January. Over 400 hundred guests were present, the guests included members of parliament, multi denominational religious dignitaries, associations, unions, volunteers, hospital and health officials....... too many for me to mention, however a mixture of peoples. We were greeted at the door by the Hon Kevin Rudd, he held out his hand and said “hello I’m Kevin”...... not what I was expecting and on his right was the Hon Colin Barnett. It was all so surreal, the hall was very hot, the drinks were flowing freely and people mingling and talking.




There was the traditional opening, followed by the National Anthem: Advance Australia Fair and the Prime Ministers speech. The Hon Kevin Rudd praised our beaches and our natural environment.
“As a Prime Minister I am doing something a little different this year....... what I have sought to do this week is to take some time to travel to each of our State capitals.... to take Australia Day to the people”
“The nation is much bigger than Canberra. The nation extends – at least at my last report – beyond the boundaries of the Australian Capital Territory. This is a vast nation.

Tracy and I spoke to many people; including the PM, he knew the name of the midwife at his birth, that was impressive, midwives are certainly on the Federal agenda, it was a great early evening event. We met the Federal Member for Hasluck Ms Sharryn Jackson MP, I had recently sent Ms Jackson an email, as she is my local Member of Parliament, asking her what her position was on Homebirth, MBS, PBS and Midwifery models of care. It was refreshing to see she had read my email and responded by saying, "yes midwives not happy, I am not happy" so lets hope things move forward.


We were also fortunate to meet the Hon Nicola Roxon, the Minister for Health and Aging, what a delight Nicola is.... we spent quite some time discussing the issues surrounding midwives and midwifery... the take home message for midwives: was to work together, all come from the same page and support each other, which also means supporting the Australian College of Midwives who is actively fighting for the rights of the midwife in Australia.



It was a fruitful evening, networking and getting to talk to the parliamentarians, I was really impressed with Nicola Roxon.... she is dynamic and intelligent, a woman before her time.... I really hope it all pays off... I believe as midwives if we could get MBS & PBS off the ground and into mainline practice.... Homebirth will follow... we have a two year grace to work out a framework suitable for independent or private practice midwifery.... lets take one step at a time, ensure the first steps and the rest will follow.... don't throw the baby out with the bath water....it will happen in due course.....

Thursday, January 14, 2010

The Big Picture in Midwifery – WA Branch Report


Allow me to begin by offering a huge and heart-felt thanks to everyone who worked so tirelessly and contributed to the organisation of the ‘Big Picture in Midwifery’ tour of Western Australia. Including all of the magnificent meals provided to me whilst I travelled – I got home a more ‘rounded’ version of my former self! 
I had the absolute honour and pleasure of meeting midwives, working across all spectrums of midwifery care from all over the state – managers, educators, researchers, those working clinically in a hospital, community midwives and those in independent practice. Thank you to all of you that took time out of your busy days (and so often on your days off!) to come and hear about how the Australian College of Midwives is working hard to help you be informed about and meet the coming changes to the way that you will renew your registration and also the implications for the profession with the funding of the recent Maternity Services Review recommendations.

I arrived in Perth on Friday 13th November, excited at having been asked to speak at the WA Branch’s ‘Magic of Midwifery’ Education Day. There were over 100 midwives attending and it was such an honour to have the entire morning with this group of incredible professionals, speaking about the proposed changes, answering questions and watching the group become more motivated and inspired about the possible ways forward for the profession.
On the morning of Monday 16th November, I presented to the team of midwives at Margaret River Hospital, before heading up to Bunbury for an afternoon session, where midwives from Collie, Bridgetown, Busselton and Manjimup joined us via teleconference. Thanks to the, Nurse Unit Manager at Bunbury Regional Hospital for all her help in getting this presentation and teleconferencing facilities up and running!
Tuesday 17th November, I flew to Albany to meet with the lovely team of midwives at Albany Hospital. Thanks to the Nurse Unit Manager for picking me up from the airport (only to drive me straight back again when I realized I’d left my suitcase behind ) and for organising a great lunch! By holding the presentation close to the Ward we had a great turnout – thanks to those of you who came in on your day off!

The following day, Wednesday 18th November saw me tripping off to Kalgoorlie to be met by almost 100% of the midwifery workforce of Kalgoorlie! We had a great afternoon and as always I felt a deep sense of personal satisfaction as I watched midwives begin to realise that their professional body cares very much about them and is supporting them to be informed about and supported to meet the changes with national registration and advocates for them on a daily basis amidst some of the most politically influential medical groups.
On Thursday 19th November, I was excited to meet with a large group of midwives at St John of God Hospital in Subiaco, Perth. Thanks for organising the session and also for my lovely box of chocolates! (More padding to the ‘roundedness’ that I took home with me!) 
After a lovely weekend with my Mum and children in Margaret River, I drove to Fremantle to meet with the fabulous team at the Community Midwifery Program WA. After some regrettable delays, due to technical difficulties with the data projector, the presentation continued without a hitch! Thank you to CMWA, and to those midwives in independent practice who were able to come along.
Tuesday 24th November found me in Geraldton, and despite the fact that my plane was delayed 1 ½ hours, it was wonderful to revisit where I had spent part of my childhood. Thank you to the, Nurse Unit Manager for her help in getting me to and from the airport and especially to all the midwives who waited for me to arrive (despite the SkyWest Airlines delays!)
Wed 25th November was the day I headed off to Port Hedland. I was thrilled to see so many midwives from Port Hedland Hospital and a major midwifery contingent from Karatha and also Tom Price join us via teleconference.
I had no idea that my final day is WA was going to be such a huge finale, but Thursday 26th November held a number of gems. In the morning I met with the, Principal Midwifery Advisor for the WA Department of Health. I was gratified to see that the Dept of Health is working hard for the midwifery profession to help prepare them for national registration. WA’s first priority is workforce planning – involving creating a workforce planning committee and looking at details like:
• How many midwives are there in WA?
• Where are they working?
• How many students and graduates are there?
• What models of care exist in WA?
• What is an appropriate midwifery workforce model to discern appropriate staffing requirements for maternity care?

The Principal Midwifery Advisor is clearly committed to her role as and is keen to make a swift and positive impact for West Australian midwives.
The final presentation of the tour ended at the King Edward Memorial Hospital in Perth. We had an overwhelming attendance of 26 midwives from the King Edward and no less than 13 sites joining us via teleconference!

Thanks to every midwife from Newman, Rockingham, Bentley, Busselton, Katanning, Derby, Narrogin, Broome, Denmark and Kalgoorlie who were able to attend!
I was so lucky to spend time travelling the state meeting with many midwives, and I can only hope that those of you that I met are now championing all the new and exciting information to your colleagues to make sure that every midwife is feeling supported to meet these changes! Please remember to keep in touch – that’s what a professional body is for – to support you and offer you a community.

Remember, the strength of the profession, lies in the diversity of the care that you offer women. Celebrate being ‘with woman’, in whatever way that looks like for you –WE DO!!!I look forward to seeing you again in 2010!

Kindest regards

Abby Clemence
National Programs Manager