Midwives + Doulas - The Best Pregnancy Combo Since PB + Pickles!
“Aren’t a midwife and a doula basically the same thing?” “I have a midwife, so I don’t need a doula.” Although midwives + doulas share a lot in common, they actually bring distinctly different roles and skillsets to your birth environment! Having both a midwife and a doula as part of your birth team can statistically improve your birth outcomes and satisfaction; it’s the best pregnancy combo since peanut butter and pickles. :)
6 ways midwives + doulas support you
and why having both might be #yourbestbirth team!
Midwives + doulas are similar because:
They both support the birth location of your choice.
In Alberta, Registered Midwives and professional doulas are both able to support you at the birth location of your choice: hospital or home, urban or rural, in water or on land, in a hotel room or the backseat of a car [ but ideally not that last one! ]. Midwives carry with them essential equipment, supplies, and drugs to safely support labor, birth, and early postpartum situations in any location. And as unregulated caregivers, doulas are able to provide prenatal, birth, and postpartum support wherever you may need.
They both provide continuity of care.
Unlike working with a family doctor or obstetrician, it is virtually guaranteed that you will know both the midwife + doula who attend to you on birth day. Part of the midwifery model of care is to provide continuity of care, meaning that the midwifery team you meet as part of your prenatal management will also be the team who assists you in delivering your baby, as well as provides you early postpartum home visits. Similarly, your doula is a maternity resource who not only provides continuity of care, but is completely subject to your personal choice; you find and hire the caregiver who fits best for you. This means that when it comes to birth day, the faces in the room will have a pre-existing relationship with your family, which ultimately leads to more customized care for you.
They are both evidence-based maternity practitioners.
Research shows that families who work with a midwife or a doula experience excellent birth outcomes. Midwifery care is associated with a decreased risk of pre-term birth, a decreased use of pain medication, and a decrease in episiotomy rates. The evidence for doula support shows a decreased risk of Caesarean Section, and increased average APGAR health score for baby. And both care providers have been shown to reduce use of pain medication and to significantly increase a family’s birth satisfaction.
Midwives + doulas are different because:
They offer medical vs. non-medical scopes of care.
A Registered Midwife’s purpose is to provide health counselling and supervision to families during pregnancy, birth, and postpartum. This includes prenatal testing, prescription of medication, management of delivery, and postpartum follow-up including infant feeding support, newborn wellness checks, and birth control.
A doula’s purpose is to provide informational, emotional, and physical support to families during pregnancy, birth, and postpartum. This may include prenatal education, checklists and birth preparation tools, physical support during labor, management of the physical birth space [ ambiance, crowd control, set-up/clean-up of supplies ], and postpartum follow-up including infant feeding support and family wellness resources.
While a midwife’s and doula’s skills are complementary, and are performed with the common values of continuity of care and evidence-based advice, they each bring a clearly different focus to your maternity team.
Their hands-on care windows during labor are different.
A midwife will typically join your birth experience when you’re in active labor: a vaginal exam of 6+ centimetres dilated, or a contraction pattern of 4-5 contractions per 10 minutes. By contrast, a doula is able to join your labor as early as you feel that you need hands-on support; and, because a doula does not perform vaginal exams, they judge the “active-ness” of your labor solely by the intensity of what they see and hear from you. A doula is also an excellent tool for nudging early labor into full-blown active labor through their knowledge of positioning, motivational speech, and the feeling of safety and security their presence brings to your labor environment.
Doulas are able to perform more than one role.
Because a midwife’s purpose during your labor is to supervise the medical health of you and your baby, there’s not really capacity for them to take on additional jobs. Their hands will be kept incredibly busy between checking baby’s heart tones, taking your blood pressure, thoroughly charting the situation, and preparing the equipment and supplies required to support a safe delivery. A doula’s role in your birth space is much more flexible: they can act as a laundry person, chef + server, luggage porter, or dog feeder, and depending on their training they may be able to bring specialized skills such as professional photography, acupressure, or lactation support.
Now that you know why midwives + doulas are a match made in heaven, are you ready to bring both resources into your birth team? adora is accepting Calgary birth doula + photography clients for births at South Health Campus, Rockyview General Hospital, Foothills Medical Centre, Peter Lougheed Centre, High River Hospital, Arbor Birth Centre, Canmore Hospital, and supervised home birth environments! Book a meet + greet today to learn more!