SSWHG Midwifery Conference

Today we celebrated 100 years of midwifery at the UCC in Cork. What an inspirational day it was! The Midwifery conference started with Professor John Higgins; the head of maternity services in South/ South West hospital groups and CUMH- expressing sincere thanks to midwives for their skills, expertise, love and for the dedication that we give to our population. 

The District Midwifery Officer for Cork and Kerry home birth: Siobhán Sweeney gave a wonderful presentation on the home birth service, self employed community midwives and the Maternity strategy. After a warm introduction from Siobhán; our very own community midwives Mary Cronin and Elke Hasner delivered an impressive presentation on the HSE home birth service here in Cork. Mary and Elke spoke of how they implemented the service together with the HSE, giving the background history of our midwifery-led service and outlined the details of the tailored care that we give to our clients. They went on to show reassuring statistics on safe home birth and impressively high breastfeeding rates of 96% on discharge.

The conference was a huge success with inspirational speakers discussing topics such as breastfeeding, infant mental health, the power of skin to skin, bonding, maternal attachment- Mental health for mothers and opportunities for better support and satisfaction. 

Upon reflection we agreed that our service and our continuity of care enables us to really care for these families in a way that truly supports them through these transitions. 

How fortunate we are to be in this wonderful and unique position.