Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Last night

I was on call last night and during the day. We have a new midwifery student with us as well so she was hanging out with me in the office yesterday afternoon. She was a homebirth midwife and decided to become a CNM :) I expect to learn many things from her and hopefully will have some things to teach her.

We had one lady come in last night for labor....I wasn't surprised as we had done a labor check in the office with her. Kinda worked out nice, the student got to meet this soon-to-be mom. She had a baby girl, and did a nice job birthing her baby! The student caught the baby...I think she was really nervous being the first birth with new preceptors. I tried to put her at ease as much as possible. Part of the weirdness for her is that she has never worked anywhere but in a homebirth practice...so to be here in the hospital is just very new. I told her to do what she wants....to use or not use the nurses as much as she needs to...just chill and take your time.

The student is coming from another clinical site where the midwives are apparently not very student-friendly. The previous student (who I so bonded with and will be going to Las Vegas next trip with us - woohoo) came from the same site and had many horror stories to share. I think it's so sad that this has happened to them. Talk about a medal for surviving the trenches of Worst Midwife Preceptors Possible. I mean really, this site would brag about how many students have left or been fired from their clinical site. Ummm, duh....

I love to teach...anyone....I think it's just an opportunity though for me to hear the sound of my own voice. :p

2 comments:

slh35661 said...

I love precepting midwife students. I love to do it in a non-threatening way. The idea is to mentor them, not chew them up and spit them out. How well do we learn when we are afraid? Not well. Why would I want my midwife students to be afraid of me? Power. Midwives are supposed to be about EM-power-MENT! This includes giving our students empowerment. I am not a wimp as an instructor, I just don't believe fear of the preceptor is conducive to good learning. It just gets the students to do only what they think you want and not what they genuinely feel might be good.

Ciarin said...

My sentiments exactly!