What has public health got to do with midwifery? Midwives' role in securing better health outcomes for mothers and babies

Background: The maternity services hold a unique position in influencing current and future maternal and infant health and midwives play a pivotal role. However, midwifery's role in public health is rarely acknowledged by the system or by midwives themselves. In fact most midwives may find it difficult reconciling public health with the care they provide. Aim and methods: This paper aims to raise midwives' public health consciousness and explores the ways in which they can, regardless of the maternity service context in which they work, explicitly acknowledge their own public health practice and the role of midwifery more generally in securing maternal and infant health. Discussion: Salient examples in antenatal, intrapartum and postnatal care have highlighted how midwives can engage in public health issues relevant to their everyday clinical practice and in so doing re-define and extend their boundaries of care. Public health has much to do with midwifery and midwifery has much to do with public health. Implications for practice: Midwifery practice can have a profound impact on maternal and infant health both short and long-term, so it is critical that all midwives take up the public health challenge for the benefit of the population they serve. (C) 2010 Australian College of Midwives. Published by Elsevier Australia (a division of Reed International Books Australia Pty Ltd). All rights reserved.