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December 4, 2008 Midwives respond to SOGC release detailing a shortage of maternity care providers Midwives support a national maternity care strategy to ensure that pregnant women and newborns have access to appropriate "While we support initiatives to make sure that there are enough Obstetricians to provide care to women when needed, midwives are appropriate providers for pregnant woman who are low risk," says Katrina Kilroy, President of the Association of Ontario Midwives. "Midwifery care has excellent health outcomes, low intervention rates and extremely high client satisfaction ratings." Strategies to address a shortage of maternity care providers must retain what's important to women, including women as the primary decision-makers in their care, continuity of care and as birth close to home as possible. "There need not be a disconnect between the care women want and what they can access," says Kilroy. "We need to continue to grow midwifery across the country and continue to support family physicians to provide maternity care. In order have a viable system where low-risk providers care for low-risk women, they need to be able to transfer to an Obstetrician when high-risk care is needed. So we need to ensure that there are adequate Obstetricians to play this role." Ontario is an excellent example of including Midwives in a response to the maternity care provider shortage. The Ontario government has invested in doubling the number of midwives in the province by the year 2012. This investment, announced in 2006, will see the number of Midwives grow from 400 to 800, when they could attend approximately 16 percent of provincial births. In Ontario, Midwives provide care in communities across the province in clinics, homes and 75 hospitals. In addition, some communities are interested in pursuing interprofessional models of care between physicians and midwives. New |
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