We have been asked by various entities to elaborate on how we assign academic credit to the student holding a State Midwifery License or Certification.
Every state has a minimum standard for numbers and kinds of clinical experiences as well as for academic requirements. These do vary slightly from state to state, but in general, they are parallel to the MANA CORE COMPETENCIES, and the NARM requirements.
This is true of the State of New Mexico where the College is licensed by the New Mexico Commission of Higher Education. The College recognizes the academic and clinical requirements set out by such documents as being equivalent of 3 years of college level work. Therefore, the BS degree offered by our institution consists of one more year to include:
- 3 credits of Introduction to Statistics,
- 3 credits of Analytical Writing
- 18 credits are awarded for the production of a clinical Senior Research Thesis to be supervised by a clinical preceptor and reviewed by the College's Faculty Board, made up of the current clinical and academic faculty of the college, with additional representatives from the student body and from the New Mexico Midwives Association, and from persons conversant with Masters and Ph.D. level education.
The following are the areas all licensed and certified midwives will have covered to pass their certifying or licensing exams, and the credit hours the National College of Midwifery has assigned for each:
- Human Life Science (6 credit hours) The course of study will have included Anatomy and Physiology, Fetal Development, Genetic Screening, and Applied Microbiology, in order to pass the licensing or certifying exams.
- Psychosocial Issues (6 credit hours) The course of study will have included Communication and Counseling, Cultural Issues, Human Sexuality, and Perinatal Education including Lactation, in order to pass the licensing or certifying exams.
- Antepartum Management (6 credit hours) The course of study will have included Basic Skills, Risk Screening, Physical Assessment, Provision of Care, Complications, Pharmacology, Nutrition, Diagnostic Lab Tests and Procedures, Observational and Charting Skills, in order to pass the licensing or certifying exams.
- Intrapartum Management (6 credit hours) The course of study will have included Basic Skills, Risk Screening Physical Assessment, Provision of Care, Complications, Pharmacology, Diagnostic Lab Tests and Procedures, Observational Skills and Charting, and IV Therapy, in order to pass the licensing or certifying exams.
- Postpartum Management (6 credit hours) The course of study will have included Basic Skills, Risk Screening, Physical Assessment, Provision of Care, Complications, Pharmacology, Diagnostic Lab Tests and Procedures, Observational Skills and Charting, in order to pass the licensing or certifying exams.
- Newborn Management (6 credit hours) The course of study will have included Basic Skills, Risk Screening, Physical Assessment, Provision of Care, Diagnostic lab Tests and Procedures, Pharmacology, Observational Skills and Charting, and Neonatal Resuscitation, in order to pass the licensing or certifying exams.
- Well Woman Reproductive Health Care (6 credit hours) The course of study will have included Risk Screening, Provision of Care, diagnostic Lab Tests and Procedures, Pharmacology, and Observational Skills and Charting, in order to pass the licensing or certifying exams.
- Professional Issues (6 credit hours) The course of study will have included the History of Midwifery, Ethics, Laws and Regulations, Protocols, Community Health Issues, Out-of-Hospital Birth and starting a small business, in order to pass the licensing or certifying exams.
Clinical:
Clinically, the student will over a minimum of 12 months in clinical settings, have been at a minimum of 20 births as an active participant (12 contact hours for each).
Functioning in the role of primary midwife under supervision, the student must have attended
- a minimum of 20 births (24 contact hours for each), a minimum of 10 of which were attended as a primary provider under supervision in homes or other out-of-hospital settings. A minimum of 3 of these must be as the primary provider under supervision with women for whom the student has provided primary care during at least 4 prenatal visits, birth, 1 newborn exam, and 1 postpartum exam.
- 55 prenatal exams (0.5 contact hours each)
- 20 initial prenatal exams (1 contact hour each)
- 20 newborn exams (0.5 contact hours each)
- 40 postpartum exams of mother and baby (1 contact hour each)
- 30 family planning visit, consultations and /or referrals (0.5 contact hours each)
These amount to 832.5 contact hours, or 27.75 semester credit hours.
Most midwives get many more experiences than these, but these are the nationally accepted minimums set by NARM.
The conversion from contact to credit hours is 30 contact hours = 1 credit hour.
In addition, most students will have observed and taught a series of prenatal childbirth classes and breastfeeding classes.