ChatGPT is a phenomenon that is causing both concern and excitement in academic circles.  The concern is about students being tempted to use the AI to write their essays.  The excitement is about students learning to critique what the AI program writes in response to questions.  There is also conversations about whether AI can mark students assignments!  I enjoyed reading this article by Mark Schaefer on Medium outlining 20 Entertaining Uses of ChatGPT You Never Knew Were Possible.  I like asking the AI questions, to see what comes up.  I am teaching a cours ..read more

 Our ABC is investigating giving birth in Australia! Despite Australia having one of the lowest maternal and infant mortality rates in the world, too many women are emerging from the birth system feeling hurt and damaged. Induction and caesarean section rates are soaring but there is no change in key indicators such as stillbirth. Meanwhile, physiological birth and breastfeeding rates plummet.  Please share this request for birth stories with all your friends and neighbours!     Here is more information and the links: https://www.abc.net.au/news/health/2022-11-03/birth-pr ..read more

  The Australian Midwifery and Maternity Alliance (AMMA) is a national group of midwifery academics, researchers, clinicians, and maternity consumers focused on improving universal primary maternity care for Australian women and their families. Our work aims to strategically enable evidence informed policy and practice resulting in high quality, maternity services. We are seeking 4 key maternity election commitments to improve outcomes for women, their babies and families and to build healthier, stronger communities: 1. Continuity of Midwifery Carer 80% target nationally to improv ..read more

Through the Pinard is a podcast dedicated to exploring midwifery research. In Episode 19, Liz McNeil from Flinders University interviews me about my research on developing undergraduate midwifery students' social and emotional skills required for good teamwork.   The development of health students teamwork skills is vital. Review after review and root cause analysis after root cause analysis identifies poor teamwork, suboptimal communication and inadequate collaboration as core contributors to poor outcomes for health service users and bullying cultures.  We used a structured wh ..read more

This letter below, with a large number of signatories, was published in the Guardian in response to an inflammatory, scaremongering 'opinion' piece in the Guardian on the 4 July 2021  The headline to the article by Sonia Sodha, “No evidence and little research – it’s no wonder that women and babies continue to die”, could not be further from the truth. There is extensive high-quality evidence examining the problems Sodha describes, including on prevention of mother and baby deaths, prevention of harm and psychological trauma, the impact of inequalities and ethnic disparities. Research add ..read more

I'm delighted to share the news that I've passed examination for my PhD.   The abstract for my thesis is presented below.  I've added the link to the thesis to anyone who would like to explore further.  Teamwork skills are an intrinsic part of day-to-day activities of maternity services, influencing workplace culture, midwife retention and quality, safe care. Effective teamwork depends upon the social and emotional competencies involved in interpersonal interactions in the workplace. Intra- and inter-professional relationship components of effective teamwork are contingent upon ..read more

 My Midwifery Today newsletter arrived in my email inbox this evening.  This 2001 article by Michel Odent, one of my many heroes in the birthing arena, was reproduced in the newsletter and I thought it was so apt.  I had to share it here.  Michel's title is How to make a homebirth long and difficult.  However, it fits for birth in hospital too.   by Michel Odent From Having a Baby Today, 2001 Editor’s Note: Even though this article is from 20 years ago, it is still fitting today. As soon as you think that you are in labor, call some friends and inv ..read more

Continuity of midwifery care provides superior maternal and neonatal outcomes (Sandall et al., 2016). Access to continuity of care models is limited, both for women and for midwifery students who have the opportunity to gain direct experience of such models. There is also concern that placing students in a continuity of care model rather than a standard hospital model of care may reduce their learning. New research from Professor Kathleen Baird, Ms Carolyn Hastie, Ms Paula Stanton and Emeritus Professor Jenny Gamble of the Transforming Maternity Care Collaborative focussed on the learning exp ..read more

 Professor Hannah Dahlen writes: Birth trauma week starts on the 6th and goes until the 12th September and I will be focusing on this a lot in the coming week.  There is a common myth out there that is also often politically hijacked that birth trauma is just physical trauma and hence the focus ends up on the pelvic floor and manifests as anti-normal birth.  As over a decade of ours and others’ research has shown this is just the tip of the iceberg.  Birth trauma is so often about not being listened to, disrespected and losing control. It often leaves no physical scars ..read more

 Hey world! You need to know this information! Continuous monitoring doesn't change outcomes for the baby! It does raise the rate of major abdominal surgery for the woman though. It also affects the infant's microbiome via surgical birth. Stop tying women down in labour. Intrapartum cardiotocograph monitoring and perinatal outcomes for wome... https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S187151921930825X Here's a riveting blog post about the fascinating back story to the paper, written by the author of the paper ..read more