One Step Forward and Two Steps Back?

Hillary — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 15:00:03 +0000

New midwifery legislation is causing some women to delay pregnancy in Nova Scotia

In March of this year, Nova Scotia became the first Atlantic province to legislate and regulate the profession of midwifery. While this move was celebrated by many as a step forward for women and families, activists with close ties to the midwifery movement feel their work is far from complete.

“All birthing women need a choice of where they birth and who their caregiver is - I think good midwife and family-led legislation could provide that," remarks Halifax doula, Lindsay Miller. "Yet here we are so tangled up in bureaucracy and old school policy that the potential benefits of legislation are not being seen by the people it is meant to serve.”

For many women in Nova Scotia, access to care based on the Canadian midwifery model - a model based on tenets of continuity of care and choice of birth place – has become more difficult since the introduction of legislation, rather than less.

Early in 2008, three District Health Authorities – the IWK Health Centre, Guysborough/Antigonish/Strait (GASHA) and the south shore - were chosen as model sites into which midwifery services would be integrated into the existing health system, and midwives, or a midwife in the case of GASHA, were hired to work in each.

As promising as this milestone seemed, it was quickly overshadowed by some glaring flaws in the process of midwifery integration that leave many women questioning whether we are indeed any further ahead in terms of maternity care in this province.

At the IWK model site, homebirth, or its lack of availability, has garnered most of the attention.

Erin Hemmens

One Step Forward and Two Steps Back?