UK Midwife moving to US seeks advice!! Please help

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Hello

I am a UK registered midwife - direct entry - 3 year BSc Degree (Honors) in Midwifery. I do not have a nursing qualification. I graduated in the top 10% of my class. I am currently practising in a large teaching hospital in the UK since August 2007 when I qualified. I have delivered 130 babies as the primary health care professional, assisted with instrumental and Cesarean birth, and supervised both medical and midwifery students in delivery. My skills set includes IV cannulation and perineal suturing.

I am moving to Virginia (Lexington) in August - my husband has accepted a tenure track position at a university there.

I am looking at my ptions for practice in the US. Virginia does not recognize CM, but does recognize CNM.

I have done some research and it looks at though my only options are

i. to do an accelerated BSN (Shenandoah or elsewhere) and then to a Masters in to become a CNM (perhaps also at SU)

ii. to do a CNM degree at somewhere like Philadelphia U, or Cincinnatti U. via distance.

iii. to become a CPM - this would allow me only to do home birth and feels limiting compared to what I am currently doing and what I would like to do.

The first option may take 3 years, the second 2.5 years. It seems that my current qualifications and experience will count for almost nothing in terms of the length and cost of study.

Can anyone provide any advice that might help me in this situation. Are their any other options??!!

Also, I need to get my degree equivalency determined. The degree co-ordinator at Philadelphia U suggested CGFNS (http://www.cgfns.org/), ICD (http://www.icdeval.com/) or WES (http://www.wes.org/index.asp). Any advice here on which is best and the likely cost?

Thank you (in advance) for any advice you might be able to offer!!

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OK - take a deep breath because the path is going to be difficult. I am a UK trained UK nurse midwife with tones of experience and educated up to Masters. I have been living in the USA for three years. The advice IO am going to give you is my experience. Home birth midwifery in the USA is NOTHING like home birth in the UK- it sits on the fringes of the community and misunderstood by the general population. If you want to practice midwifery in hospital your only option is to qualify as an RN - unless you can work in NY and then CM I think practice in hospitals. I am not sure how easy it will be for you to get on a RN course but you can do an accelerated course over 12 months. I am working with frontier to gain my MSN ( my original masters is not in nursing its allied to) and my CNM - USA style. Great school highly recommend it all distance learning except for two campus trips. WES is properly the best for evaluation of degree. What sort of visa is your husband coming over with as not all visa allow the spouses to work I think you will need a green card - but not 100% on that.

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Belinda-Wales seems to have the best adbice and most similar position.

I will second the home birth being different than in UK. If it were me and we were going to be making our home here, I would go the route which allowed me the most freedom to practice. (Coming from someone who just began the nursing school process, but began the CPM track and ran into some significant hurdles)

I will say that I have heard rave reviews of Shenandoah's program. If I remember correctly, they even have an internship/rotation on The Farm in Tennessee (http://www.thefarmmidwives.org/) which signifies to me a philosophical position that I could get behind.

Best wishes! We need all the woman centered birth attandents we can get!

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Also- did I understand that your husband will be working at Shenandoah? If so, there may be a significant cost savings in the form of a tuition reduction for spouses of employees.

BTW-Frontier is a great distance choice also. I would personally do Frontier's program over Phila. or Cincinnati in a heart beat :)

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Dear Belinda-wales and SiennaGreen,

Thank you both very much for your comments, I'm finding this process a bit of a minefield and pretty confusing ! But, your comments confirm what I have been thinking, that CNM is the way to go. I think I would find working as a CPM too limiting, and would feel on the fringe of things and my practice potentially exposed and vulnerable. Because midwifery is so mainstream here in the UK, I am not willing to have my US practice limited to the sidelines, I want to be able to practice in a variety of settings if I wish and be recognised as a legitimate health care professional. I think the CNM qualification is most likely to meet those criteria.

So, I think I will have to just grin and bear it - and do another 3 years of study. It will not be all bad because I may well end up with a masters at the end of it all. I am interested in comments on my options, from my research it There seems to be a number of ways to do this (there may be more):

i. BSN accelerated (15 months) (Shennandoah University - total fee cost $20K approx) then MSN in Midwifery distance education (16-20 months) (Philadelphia U, Cinncinatti U, Stony Brook, Frontier U). Acceptance to accelerated BSN will probably require pre-requisites of Human Anatomy (8 credits) and statistics which I don't have and which will take 2 semesters to attain.

ii. MSN at University of Virginia (24 months and total fee cost of about 24K) then post-master course in Midwifery at Shenandoah U (12 months). Acceptance to MSN at UVa will probably require pre-requisites of Human Anatomy (8 credits) and statistics which will take 2 semesters to attain.

iii. RN in nursing (5 semesters at community college - cost of fees? But less than above, ?10k total) then MSN in Midwifery via distance education (16-20 months) (Philadelphia U, Cinncinatti U, Stony Brook, Frontier U).

In answer to questions: My husband is a US citizen so I will be able to get a green card. We may be able to get some discounts on courses because of my husband's teaching post in Lexington.

Thank you and best wishes with your midwifery ambitions too...:specs:

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Just a quick question. I already have a BS in Midwifery (direct entry), and need an RN in order to enrol for a Masters in Midwifery at Philadelphia, Frontier etc to achieve the CNM qualification.

Is it okay just to get an RN at a Community College, or do people recommend getting a BSN instead? Comments/thoughts much appreciated.

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I would suggest getting that answer, IMO in writing, from the schools you are interested in attending for CNM. I'm not sure how your degree will transfer, et cet. I know if you are starting from scratch here, even though I may have a BS in another unrecognized field, I still need to BSN in order to begin CNM (Masters) grad school.

If it were me, I would have all of those trails run down and worked out before embarking on a path. The last ting you want to is go one wayand find out last minute that it won't work...

Best wishes!

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Unless, ofcourse I went a direct entry Masters route...but those programs aren't numerous and they are difficult to gain entry. (Penn in Philadelphia, http://www.nursing.upenn.edu/admissions/accelerated/Pages/default.aspx)

Check with your possible schools!

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OK - This is just my opinion but I think RN ADN community college will be fine with BSN in other field your case midwifery will get in to the frontier program - I got on to frontier with UK qualifications and I do not have BSN. ( I have the equivalent in a health related subject)You will need to get WES to credential your BSN Midwifery. - You could do an AND in nursing in a little over a year.

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