Experiences of student midwife

[partyskirt]

My midwife asked if I would be happy to have a student midwife on board for the pregnancy and also at the labour. I said no, but now feel bad. Has anyone agreed to this and had a positive experience?

One of my DC is a student and during the first delivery the senior midwife attended to the mother as she had to deal with the father who fainted!

I'm happy to have students at antenatal appointments. In my first labour I had several students, in my second I refused students as I wanted to keep people to a minimum.

madwoman

As a midwife any student I'm looking after/supervising is practising on my PIN. Anything she does or fails to do is on my head and my registration.

What level of supervision they require is up to the midwife. So I might have a 2nd year student who I think is ok in the room on their own, that they'll call me if there's a problem. And I'll pop in every now and then and check. Conversely I may have a third year student I won't let out my sight! Depends on the individual and also how well I know them/have worked with them before.

But if I make a wrong call and the student doesn't recognise a problem etc it would be me in trouble.

I have had a few students involved in my pg and births, and the one that came to a home water birth was delighted to be able to do that. I always found them very capable and sensible.

God almighty, imagine giving birth in a lecture theatre! How do you even organise that? Run around the medical school with a megaphone shouting 'quick, lads, we've got one!'

I had a student midwife at the birth of DS. I don't really understand why you would say no - how else are they supposed to learn? It's not as if they will be solely responsible for the birth, they are there to assist.

When I had DS1, a final year student came to observe my NCT classes. She said she'd happily come in with us when we went into labour, so she met us at the hospital, stayed the entire 4 hours we were there - and when DS's little feet popped out unexpectedly rather than his head, she was very calm, called for help, never left my side and was entirely fab. She confessed afterwards she almost died of fright as nobody had spotted he was breech, but she certainly didn't show it. Great experience, and her continued presence by my side certainly wouldn't have happened if she hadn't been a student (and therefore supernumery)

I had students at some of my antenatal appointments but where fully supervised by a trained midwife.
Didn't have any in labour but would have been happy too. A student came to talk to me on the postnatal ward and she was great. Had some students with the midwives on the postnatal visits.
I have no problems with students the best way to learn is by hands on experience.

It was like having 2 midwives, give it a go OP! Honestly i felt so looked after during labour. I made the student tell me all about her ballet. I think she had work to do though mind

As a medical student myself (albeit a 32yr old heavily pregnant one) I have been very interested to read some of your comments about having students, particularly medical students, in your consultations.

I always see it as an immense privilege to be allowed to observe a consultation or take part in a procedure whether that be in a GPs surgery, a clinic or in theatre. I would never assume the right to be there and completely understand if a patient is not happy with my presence.

The situation should be managed by the HCP the student is attending with - that is, patients should be asked for consent for a student to be present, preferably before being introduced (i.e. outside of the consultation room). Patients should never feel bullied into having students present. Unfortunately you do get some senior doctors who forget about the patient experience and presume consent, ignoring the patient whilst wittering on in medical jargon and humiliating the students publicly for their lack of knowledge. Thankfully this more 'old school' approach does seem to be dying out. There are of course also a number of immature students who lack professionalism (giggling, ignoring the patient etc). Again the Dr should get a grip of this situation sharpish but if they do not you are fully within your rights to tell the students to get lost (easier said than done I know). Believe me if a student gets a telling off from a patient they will be hugely embarrassed and the situation will be less likely to arise again in the future.

My point is please do not feel that medical students presume that they can observe any medical interaction and I for one am grateful for every learning opportunity I am provided with.

I had a student midwife present when I had DD2. Straightforward labour and I quite liked listening to them discussing me while I was high on G&A. It meant I had 2 MWs with me all through labour which since I chatter away all the way through labour was great.

DS was preemie and I didn't have a student MW with me for his birth (wasn't asked if I wanted one). I did see a lovely lovely brand spanking newly qualified MW after he was born who was far better than the GP she had to refer us to.

For all my pregnancies I've seen students in the clinics, they've got to learn somehow and are well supervised. For a first birth I'd not have been happy about having a student but even for DS I'd not have minded (wasn't asked but it would have been a good learning experience since his birth was quite dramatic). But as I said I'm quite sociable and chatty during labour.

I had a student for my home birth with DC3.

She did everything, but the more experienced midwife oversaw what she was doing, and advised her, if needed. (For example, she was going to give me some stitches, but the qualified midwife said that it wasn't usual in a home birth setting, unless absolutely necessary, unlike hospital, which is more medicalised.)

It was a lovely experience, and I'm pleased I gave her that opportunity to further her training.

My niece is a trainee midwife at my local hospital (just done her first year) and I'm one of her case studies and the plan is she will deliver my baby (I'm 40+2) but she will not be doing any internals etc on me (totally her choice) the whole time she will be assisted by a senior midwife who will monitor and check everything she is doing! My neice has already delivered 20 odd babies all in totally different circumstances

My attitude is how would they learn anything if everyone said no!

homepride how will they learn? They will learn because there will always be people willing to accept them. Then there are others like myself who have very good reasons for declining. I'm sure both positions can be respected.

Baxter if all students/Drs had your attitude I would allow students.
Lack of consent is a large part of the reason patients are declining, if senior medical staff followed the guidelines better and were more respectful then students would have more opportunity to interact with a variety of patients.
The problem is not with patients dealing but with staff being obnoxious and bullying.

I had a super fast delivery with DD2. Senior midwife and a student. I was glad she was there, as DH had to go and park the car so she served as birth partner. She was fab and, as DH arrived in time, she was able to assist in the delivery.

I had a student midwife at one of my appointments, for the majority of my labour (until shift change), and my 10-day post birth appointment. She was lovely, and in the case of the antenatal appointment, better informed than the locum midwife who was there that day (had to correct her about which week I needed my anti-D jab).

My experiences were all very positive, and I'm always happy to allow students in. That said, no one should be made to feel bad if they don't want one.

Male medical students have a notoriously hard time during their Obs and Gynae blocks, because lots of people won't have medical students to start with and, often if they will, will refuse a male student. They also have a limited time on the delivery ward so they have just got to hope that a woman during their shift on delivery ward is happy to have them there.

"Nurses and doctors have to learn about smear tests. How do you feel about being expected to have a student do yours? Or a colonoscopy? Or have one pass an NG tube down your baby's nose?

You are 100% for all of those things to be performed and/or witnessed by a student?"

Happy to have a student do a smear test.

Students wouldn't do colonoscopies. That's something like gastroenterology doctors learn once they are registrars.

A student MW put an NG tube down for my 1 hour old baby as it was required.

No one is suggesting that a woman giving birth is "public property", so that's a bit of a straw man argument really, but that we need to remember that everyone needs to learn to provide medical care so that we can have fully trained and experienced doctors, nurses, midwives etc and we should at least take that into consideration, whatever any individual's final decision might be.

Aha, I see, so now it's our responsibility as women to consider de poor menz in addition to our own health.

Jesus wept!

No wonder so many have had bad experiences.

If I ever felt that my birth would not be such a private moment, then I'd honestly prefer a male student to a female one.

I have no problems having students for appointments, or taking my blood. Plenty of students have tried to take my blood . I just don't want them preforming examinations or at my birth.

They'll learn by going to every other birth where the patient has allowed/invited them to be present.

"Male medical students have a notoriously hard time during their Obs and Gynae blocks, because lots of people won't have medical students to start with and, often if they will, will refuse a male student."

Do they? I was only asked if it was ok for a student to be present...there was no discussion about who the student was...

rainbow, that's pretty unreasonable and again is just making up an argument for the sake of it.

I pointed out that the male medical students do just have a harder time of it than the female ones.

Within the NHS, there are lots of doctors, nurses, physios, OTs, male and female, in training. They do need to learn. Having been one of them, I am grateful to all those who have allowed me to take part of their training and all those who allow me to involve them in training students of all sorts now, but no one has said it is compulsory or required.

I'm just glad that there are lots of people who do take the attitude of "how would they learn anything if everyone said no!" and want to be part of that.

tabulahrasa, in the experience of my friends at university, yes, it was much harder for the male medical students. One chap stayed over the whole weekend in the delivery unit so he was right there if anyone did agree, day or night!

That's a bit of a shame really, I understand it I suppose, but still.

I was only asked if I was ok with having a student there ...DD is my second, to be quite honest I wouldn't have cared if there was a marching band in there if if might have helped, rofl.