17600 - | | | 19542 - Reply from Keely74 (USA) - 2012-11-21
| A midwife is someone who helps a woman give birth to her baby. Though, they also do a lot more than just that! Much of the time, midwives are nurses who specialize in women's health and have an extensive range of knowledge and experience regarding to pregnancy and childbirth. They help women while they are pregnant and can also give women advice on how to best care for their health if they're planning on having a baby in the near future. In many states in the United States (and countries around the world) midwives may also provide care for newborn babies. They are different from doctors who specialize in women's health, though they can still work with doctors and may even offer some of the same services depending on where they work and what their level of expertise is.
In the US, Certified-Nurse-Midwives work in hospitals, birthing centers, and even help women give birth if they choose to have their babies at home. A CPM (Certified Professional Midwife) in the United States must pass an exam to be certified and may work in birthing centers or help women give birth at home, but as far as I know they do not work in hospitals since they are not formally trained nurses. There are many different kinds of midwives in the US and Canada, and there are different levels of schooling required to qualify for each kind. If you want to know more about midwifery, there's definitely a lot of resources out there on the internet and also probably in books at your local library that also might have a lot of helpful information on the topic. Hope this helped! |
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