Certified nurse midwives are health care providers trained in two disciplines (nursing and midwifery). We provide health care for women which includes, preconception counseling, prenatal care, labor attendance and support, postpartum care, normal gynecological services, assistance with contraception, health care maintenance, and health care during menopause.
According to the National Center for Health Statistics in 1994, nurse midwives attended the births of more than 200,000 babies.
Midwifery care offers women and their families an avenue to view their pregnancy and birth as a healthy normal process instead of a medical event. Physicians are trained in medical school to look for pathologies and treat them. Most pregnancies and births are not pathological, but rather a natural unfolding of the growth of a baby. Midwives support women through this normal journey into parenthood and have better outcomes for moms and babies than physicians, even when comparing low-risk women cared for by certified nurse midwives to low-risk women cared for by MDs. Midwives are less likely to: use continuous monitoring of fetal heart tones during labor, induce or augment labor, utilize epidurals, or perform episiotomies. For more information about nurse midwives visit the American College of Nurse Midwives.
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Mendocino Coast Midwives 