Distance required for midwives

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I am planning to apply to programs this summer, but had a couple of thoughts. Are there regulations on how far a birthing center must be from a hospital that does deliveries? All of our birthing hospitals are 45 minutes to one hour away no matter what direction you go. I would love to open a birthing center one day, but not sure of the regulations. Also, do most facilities (any kind) require that you live a certain distance away? We are completely willing to move to wherever necessary; however, it is always nice to stay close to home and not uproot my family if necessary.

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Specializes in Nephrology, Cardiology, ER, ICU.

Hi and welcome.

These regulations are going to vary by state. You might want to consider looking at your states practice act.

Best wishes

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Specializes in OB.

I don't know of any states that have regulations stating how far a birth center may be from a hospital. I could be wrong, but I doubt it. Also bear in mind that there are AABC-accredited birth centers, but also many non-accredited birth centers out there. ACNM recently put out a nice PowerPoint presentation about the state of midwifery in the U.S., and one of the slides shows a map of all the accredited and non-accredited birth centers by state, hopefully you can access it:

http://www.midwife.org/acnm/files/ccLibraryFiles/Filename/000000004315/Understanding-Practice-Environment.pdf

Any job where you have to take call may require that you live a certain distance from the hospital, it varies from practice to practice.

Hope that helps.

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Wow, thanks. That was a very informative PowerPoint. After reading it I think I need to move. Lol.

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Specializes in OB.

Yes, I found it very informative as well. Still have a lot of work ahead of us!

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Specializes in Nurse-Midwife.

The AABC addresses distance a birth center is from a hospital on their website as well.

Distance: How far is too far? | American Association of Birth Centers

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Some state do require that... for example in NY the requirement is 15 minutes (as if its no hard enough already to open up a birth center there!!!)

Come to northeast PA and open a birth center here... Ill gladly assist you in anyway I can lol!!!!

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Specializes in Reproductive & Public Health.

Just want to throw out there that when you are on call, you generally have to be within ~20-30 minutes of the facility. Doesn't mean you have to *live* that close. Pretty much every hospital/birth center will have a call room.

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Thanks guys. I appreciate all of your input. I agree we do have a lot of work ahead of us. The pay for Oklahoma seems so low on the PowerPoint. Thankfully I am not doing it for the pay.

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