We are pleased to announce that the Women’s Advanced Maternity Fellowship for Rural Practitioners is now being offered through generous donations from Weyerhaeuser, Bank of Montreal, Bell Canada, Provincial Health Services Authority, Zellers, and Interior Health Authority. These organizations have offered support to further the provincial mandate of BC Women’s Hospital and Health Centre to prov...

In the United States, federal acts and regulations, as well as professional guidelines, clearly dictate that every pregnant woman has the right to base her maternity care decisions on accurate, up-to-date, comprehensible information. Despite these efforts, evidence suggests that informed consent within current health-care practice is restricted and inconsistently implemented. Patient access to ...

BACKGROUND The Australian government has announced a major program of reform with the move to primary maternity care, a program of change that appears to be at odds with current general public perceptions regarding how maternity care is delivered. METHODS A critical discourse analysis of articles published in 'The Age', a newspaper with national distribution, subsequent to the release of the ...

BACKGROUND Maternity care reform plans have been proposed at state and national levels in Australia, but the extent to which these respond to maternity care consumers' expressed needs is unclear. This study examines open-text survey comments to identify women's unmet needs and priorities for maternity care. It is then considered whether these needs and priorities are addressed in current reform...

There is a lack of systematic evidence concerning health orientation in maternity practice in the current climate of risk avoidance. The midwifery professional project is orientated toward the preservation of normal physiological processes during the maternity episode. This study investigates accounts of midwives who were working in health-orientated birth settings, to examine if and how they f...

Substantial State Government funding has been committed in Victoria for the enhancement of maternity services. The funding is intended to improve the quality of care for women and meet consumer expectations for choice and continuity of care in maternity services. This paper reports on a mid-term review (the 'Review') of the Victorian Maternity Services Program, which was conducted by the author...

INTRODUCTION In spite of a sharp decline, since 2000, in the number of rural communities in Canada that offer local maternity care, there remain significant numbers of small rural maternity services that provide elective maternity care without on-site access to cesarean section. In communities with an elective maternity service without local access to surgical capability, practitioners must be ...