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Tuskegee, in Macon County, Alabama, has played an important role in Alabama's midwifery legacy and was home to 2 different midwifery education programs from the 1920s through the 1940s. In response to a 1918 state law requiring midwives to pass an examination to receive a practice permit in their county, stakeholders developed a four-week course for Black Alabamian midwives on the grounds of Tuskegee Institute at the John A. Andrew Memorial Hospital. In the 1940s, in the same location on the grounds of Tuskegee Institute, the Tuskegee School of Nurse-Midwifery educated Black nurse-midwives to improve Black maternal and neonatal outcomes in the South., (© 2024 The Author(s). Journal of Midwifery & Women's Health published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of American College of Nurse Midwives (ACNM).)

From the 1980s to the turn of the century, Australia saw an evolution of midwifery-led models of care, in part due to legislative reform and federal funding, but largely owing to the efforts of strong midwifery leaders and consumers who rallied for the implementation of alternative models of care. Through persistence and extensive collaboration, the first South Australian birth centres were established. To better understand the evolution of midwifery-led care in South Australia and identify the drivers and impediments to inform the upscaling of midwifery models into the future. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with ten midwifery leaders and/or those instrumental in setting up birth centres and midwifery-led care in South Australia. Data was analysed using thematic analysis. Three overarching themes and several sub-themes were identified, these included: 'Midwifery suffragettes' which explored 'activism', 'adversity' and 'advocacy'; 'Building bridges' captured the importance of 'gathering midwives', a 'movement of women' and 'champions and influencers'; and 'Recognising midwifery' identified the strong 'sense of identity' needed to outface 'ignorance and opposition' and the importance of 'role reformation'. These midwifery leaders provide insight into an era of change in the history of midwifery in South Australia and contribute valuable learnings. In order to move forward, midwives must continue to embrace the political nature of midwifery, enact authentic, transformational leadership and engage women across all levels of influence. It is critical that midwives pursue equity in professional recognition, work collaboratively to provide quality, woman-centred maternity care and expand midwifery continuity of care models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The history and professionalisation of midwifery has travelled through turbulent times to arrive at an opportunity for transformation in the contemporary UK maternity system. This professionalisation, the midwifery profession and professional autonomy are explored in this article from a sociological perspective, to answer the question of whether a midwife can achieve professional autonomy within the UK system. This is a two-part article. Part one has a strong focus on the historical context of midwifery, government policy and guidelines, risk, litigation and increasing managerialisation to frame the discussion in part two. The second part provides a discussion of autonomy, choice, managerialisation and reflexive practice, to create a conceptual framework utilising the concept New Professional Midwifery. This is to centralise a core belief in midwifery autonomy and women's choice facilitation. This paper is part one of two. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: This article provides an account of the establishment and development of the contemporary nurse‐midwifery profession in Georgia, which was previously undocumented. Oral history interviews with nurse‐midwives who were in clinical and educational practice in Georgia during the 1970s and 1980s were collected and analyzed to identify factors that affected the establishment of nurse‐midwifery in this state. Methods: This study relied on historical methodology. Oral history interviews provided primary sources for analysis. Secondary sources included archives belonging to the narrators' nurse‐midwifery services as well as scholarly and professional publications from 1923 to the present. Data were analyzed using Miller‐Rosser and colleagues' method. Results: In‐depth interviews were conducted with 14 nurse‐midwives who worked in clinical practice or education in Georgia in the 1970s and 1980s. The narrators' testimonies revealed facilitators for the establishment of nurse‐midwifery in Georgia, including increasing access to care, providing woman‐centered care, interprofessional relationships, and the support of peers. Resistance from the medical profession, financial constraints, and public misconceptions were identified as barriers for the profession. Discussion: Oral histories in this study provided insight into the experiences of nurse‐midwives in Georgia as they practiced and taught in the 1970s and 1980s. Interprofessional connections and cooperation supported the nurse‐midwifery profession, and relationships with peers anchored the nurse‐midwives. Mentoring relationships and interprofessional collaboration supported the nurse‐midwives as they adapted and evolved to meet the needs of women in Georgia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the development of a collaborative model of home-based reproductive caregiving in Ireland from 1900 to 1950, focusing on the interactions of different practitioners in childbirth cases in the domestic sphere. In Ireland the move to obstetrics and trained nursing and midwifery was gradual, complicated by the needs and wants of ordinary women, who were reluctant to give up their trusted care givers and who actively sought to maintain long-standing domestic health care traditions. The result was a hybrid and collaborative model of domestic reproductive health care, requiring the attention of different practitioners, placing them in the same space, and necessitating that they work together. This dynamic and evolving system provided most pregnant, laboring, and postparturient women with essential reproductive care, but it would be overtaken by hospital-based reproductive medicine by around 1950, remaining only in folklore and memory by the late twentieth century.

Introduction: During the late 19th century and the 20th century, many allied health and technical professions, joined physicians and nurses in their formal medical and surgical comprehensive work. The professionalization process of the various medical and surgical fields demanded true incorporation of allied health professions into the medical infrastructure. Non-academic professions such as the "feldsher ", barber-surgeon, bone-setters and the midwife, transferred into realms of the academic medical and the health professions fields.

Abstract: As more midwives are becoming interested in the history of midwifery and carrying out historical research, it is opportune to consider some of the problems and pitfalls of this approach. The study and writing of history initially involves the collection of evidence, followed by its critical analysis and interpretation. The scarcity and reliability of sources poses the first problem. Even with the greatest of insight, it is impossible to fully reconstruct the past and eliminate bias. Evidence is open to manipulation and distortion, affecting the way in which findings are presented to a readership. This paper, aimed at novice researchers in the field, focuses on some of the fundamental principles of good research, and contains examples of ways in which the past may be misinterpreted or changed. The nature and construction of professional knowledge will also be briefly examined to establish whether objectivity is possible within historical research. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The history of the modern Italian gynecology is closely related to the figure of an enlightened clinician and passionate master, Luigi Mangiagalli (1850-1928), who, with good reason, can be considered one of the fathers of this discipline. In 1906, Mangiagalli founded the Obstetric-Gynecological Institute in Milan, directing this structure until 1925. The aim of this paper is to describe some aspects of Italian gynecology at the beginnings of the twentieth century through the analysis of 250 original medical records, dating back to the years 1906-1912, fragments of real life of women, midwives and doctors in a pioneering era of obstetrics and gynecology.

Madame du Coudray (1712-1790) was a French midwife who educated peers in rural areas. She was seen as a pioneer of simulation as she developed the first obstetric mannequin, known as 'the machine'. Complex cases could be simulated in a safe environment, which enabled midwives to improve their abilities in managing such deliveries.

Introduction: Many nursing and midwifery schools in many countries around the world awarded or still award graduation badges or pins to their graduates. All graduates from different parts of the former Kingdom of Yugoslavia and later the Republic of Yugoslavia educated in Slovenian healthcare schools received badges from these schools. Some of the graduates later employed in medical institutions across former Yugoslavia wore these badges on their uniforms. The main purpose of this historical research was to establish which Slovenian health care schools awarded the graduation badges and what they looked like. It was also investigated why the badges ceased to be awarded and what motivated Angela Boškin Faculty of Health Care in Jesenice to reintroduce awarding the badges., Methods: Due to a lack of written sources, we conducted 393 face to face and telephonic interviews with former badge recipients across Slovenia. Their existing badges were photographed. On the authors' initiative, a private collection of badges was started., Results: It has been established that in the 20th century all Slovenian secondary health schools awarded badges. The Nursing College, Ljubljana also awarded graduation badges. Five different types of badges in many variants were issued. The first badges were awarded to graduates by Slovenian oldest Nursing School, Ljubljana in 1925. The badges ceased to be awarded in the late 1970s and the early 1980s. Some questions about probable reasons for cessation of awarding badges remain unanswered. Less than a fifth of interviewees kept their badges. Graduating nursing badges were reintroduced in Slovenia in 2017 with a new badge which is presented and depicted in this article. The motivation for the reintroduction of graduating badges is also investigated., Discussion and Conclusion: Unfortunately, many Slovenian nurses and midwives are not sufficiently aware of the meaning and importance of their badges. Although badges are important for professional image and identity of nurses, badges as a symbol of nursing have become almost completely forgotten. Graduation badges are miniature works of art and are proof of the existence and development of Slovenian healthcare schools. Nursing badges present a part of nursing history as well as being our cultural heritage. The badges deserve to be written and talked about and should be displayed in a planned future Slovenian Health Care Museum.

This work uses a field survey to analyze a plenary session of the Rio de Janeiro Legislative Assembly entitled "Humanized childbirth and the right to choose." Understanding this as a political space for conflicts of knowledge pertaining to the areas of medicine, nursing, and legislature, we consider the content of this session and discourses of power/knowledge surrounding the female body and reproduction. The article explores tensions around the political struggle for "humanized childbirth" via demands made by the Regional Council of Nursing. We also address the history of the medicalization of childbirth and the role of nurses, professionals specialized in low-risk births (obstetrizes), and midwives in this process.

A case of childbirth with a fatal outcome described in the book 'The King's Court Physician: the Adventurous Life of Franz Joseph Harbaur, 1776-1822' (De lijfarts van de koning. Het avontuurlijkeleven van Franz Joseph Harbaur, 1776-1822) puts the work of the Dutch Health and Youth Care Inspectorate into an historical context by pointing out the similarities between a calamity investigation held in 1822 and the situation today. Conflicts between medical disciplinary law and criminal law, boundary disputes between various professions (in this particular case midwives and gynaecologists) and questions of openness and transparency turn out to be nothing new. By doing case studies on how to deal with calamities, it is possible to gain insight into medical failures of the past and how they were managed. It is also possible to get a better picture of the expectations that medicine had to meet in the past, and how, and under what circumstances, these have changed. This information is of value in making choices in today's healthcare system.

Until the eighteenth century, midwifery was the sole domain of women, but changes in medical science saw it appropriated by medical men and the 'man-midwife' emerged. This paper demonstrates the work of a man-midwife in a small English village in one year, 1775, using his accounts and correspondence. The man was Matthew Flinders Senior, 'surgeon and man-midwife' at Donington, Lincolnshire. He was the father of Captain Matthew Flinders, the famous navigator who mapped the coast line of Australia and who coined that name. Primary sources, published as a collection by the Lincoln Record Society, were used. Flinders Senior made a good living from his midwifery, charging rates commensurate with those charged by obstetricians today (with reduced costs for the poor). His descriptions of his practice show how midwifery was conducted in rural England during the development of medicine as a high-status profession. The paper uses data from one year to provide a snap shot of the work of a rural surgeon and man-midwife, but much more is available in the published collection, providing ready access for researchers who may like to pursue such work further.

To understand the development of public health in Croatia, there are newer insights into the life and work of John the Baptist Lalangue. John the Baptist Lalangue is most valued for implementation of the imperial law on public health and promotion of midwifery in Croatia during the second half of the 18 th century. Lalangue is the author of the first printed medical textbook in Croatian, published in 1776, entitled Medicina ruralis iliti Vrachtva ladanyszka, za potrebochu musev, y sziromakov Horvatczkoga orszaga y okolu nyega, blisnesseh mest , Trattnern, Varaždin. In the same period, Lalangue published the first Croatian midwifery textbook entitled Brevis institute de reobstetritia iliti kratek navuk od mestrie pupkorezne za potrebochu muskeh y sziromaskeh ladanovskaya horvatskoga orszaga y okolo nyega blisnesseh sztrankih , Trattnern, Zagreb. In 1779, Lalangue published his balneological debut in Croatian, the book Tractatus de aquis medicati Regnorum Croatiae et Slavoniae Iliti Izpiszavanye vrachtvenih vod Horvatzkoga y Slavonskoga orszaga y od nachina nye vsivati za potrebochu lyudih , Trattnern, Zagreb. Lalangue's works were used in systematic training and education of midwives and they, as well as Lalangue, have an inevitable place in the history of Croatian midwifery. During his life and work, John the Baptist Lalangue made immeasurable contribution to the development of Croatian public health.

Set in rural Georgia, the 1953 health film All My Babies: A Midwife's Own Story was a government-sponsored project intended as a training tool for midwives. The film was unique to feature a black midwife and a live birth at a time when southern health officials blamed midwives for the region's infant mortality rates. Produced by the young filmmaker George Stoney, All My Babies was praised for its educational value and, as this article demonstrates, was a popular feature in postwar medical education. Yet as it drew acclaim, the film also sparked debates within and beyond medical settings concerning its portrayal of midwifery, birth, and health care for African Americans. In tracing the controversies over the film's messages and representations, this article argues that All My Babies exemplified the power and limits of health films to address the complexities of race and health during an era of Jim Crow segregation.

Objective: This study aims to outline the progress of midwifery-related policies in contemporary and modern China as well as the obstacles in this process, and to provide recommendations for policy makers in the establishment of Chinese midwifery policies, ultimately promoting the development of midwifery in China., Background and Introduction: Policy plays an increasingly important role in midwifery development, particularly needed in modern China. A review of policies of midwifery could help policy makers develop effective strategies to address current problems in China, including the insufficient numbers of midwives, the shrinking of responsibility and the degradation of midwives' competency., Methods: The Policy Triangle was used to examine through literature the laws and regulations regarding midwifery from 1928 in China and was conducted from April to September in 2013. This was followed by insider interviews with two senior policy makers from the National Health Commission to explain nursing policy progress, thereby identifying the reasons why midwifery has developed more slowly than nursing., Results: The development of midwifery in China could be classified into four stages: (1) the beginning period (1928-1949), beginning with the first midwifery rules; (2) the development period (1949-1979), in which the quality and quantity of midwives were significant; (3) the unclear positioning period (1979-2008), without clear midwifery policy; and (4) the subordination to nursing period (2008-present), with the Nurse Byelaw 2008 stating that midwives must apply for nursing licenses., Discussion: The main factors influencing midwifery policies are: (1) social background, such as the changes of different governments and health care reform, and (2) the powers of the actors. Currently, it is an appropriate time to develop strategies for policy makers to facilitate midwifery development in China., Conclusions and Implications for Health Policy: Midwifery policy should be independently included in the frame of national medical industry reform because midwives are an indispensable part of the health care workforce. In-depth research should be conducted to confirm the position of midwifery in China to ensure its sustainable development., (Copyright © 2018. Published by Elsevier Ltd.)

Over the course of the twentieth century, a series of changes occurred in the understanding of childbirth, which went from being a natural reproductive phenomenon belonging to the female, domestic sphere to a professional medical matter handled in an institutional setting. Through procedures like the use of anesthesia, Cesarean sections, ultrasound and other techno-scientific interventions, rapid and significant improvements and changes took place in the health and life of society and of women. The medicalization of childbirth in the early twentieth century was part of a broader process of constructing the state and institutionalizing the patriarchy that was common throughout the region.

Background: The midwifery profession in Sweden has a history since the early 1700s when government training for midwives began. Midwifery is historically well described, but the idea of caring within midwifery is not described., Aim: The aim was to describe the patterns of ideas of caring as they appeared in midwifery during the first half of the 20th century., Research Design: This study has a hermeneutic approach and the method is history of ideas. Sources of material are taken from the journal Jordemodern (Midwifery), textbooks for midwives, and midwifery regulations. The study has a caring science perspective according to Eriksson. Ethical considerations: This study is conducted in accordance with the ethical guidelines for good scientific practice issued by The Finnish Advisory Board on Research Integrity. The special demands on approach to the analyzed text in history of ideas have been met., Findings: Three themes were identified: Serving as a way of life, Acting in a redemptive spirit, and Having independence with heavy responsibility. The various themes are not refined, but current ideas are woven into the weave that were characteristic of midwifery during the first half of the 20th century., Conclusion: History of ideas is a fruitful method for understanding and re-finding valuable cultural goods. We can once more stress the manner of being within the midwife's profession where inner values, ethos, shape the manner of conduct in the care of women in childbirth.

In 1928 members of the South Dakota State Medical Association (SDSMA or the Association) held a special meeting in Huron to consider a basic science bill that conformed "…in its entirety to the conditions existing in our state." Their draft bill proposed a standardized examination for all practitioners of the healing arts. A legislative committee, with its attorney, "…was in Pierre during the early part of the 1929 legislative session to make sure the bill was properly launched and in effective channels." Shortly after its introduction, the bill was withdrawn due to opposition from one SDSMA district whose legislative representatives were among the most influential in the legislature. A similar bill promoted by the SDSMA in 1933 also failed. It would be another six years before a basic science bill was enacted by the legislature. Eighty-nine years later, a bill governing the practice of certified nurse practitioners (NP) and certified nurse midwives (NM), including a board independent of the South Dakota Board of Medical and Osteopathic Examiners, was considered (Senate Bill 61). Introduced by a senator who characterized herself as representing the "House of Nursing," the bill challenged "…the overarching role that medicine thinks and perceives that they may have regarding advanced practice nursing practice." SB 61 passed in the senate and house and was signed by the governor. For this legislation in the 1930s and in 2017, the SDSMA's interest was defining and maintaining control of medical practice under the twin rubrics of quality and patient welfare. In both circumstances, legislators and other health care professional organizations contested not only the SDSMA's motivations, but also the evidence supporting their efforts. Our research explored (1) whether the collective viewpoints and conduct of the legislature, the SDSMA, and non-physician medical professionals are comparable in the two circumstances; and (2) if the circumstances are comparable, can we derive a useful concept or theme that could help guide the SDSMA in the future?, (Copyright© South Dakota State Medical Association.)

Background: Midwifery programs leading to registration as a midwife in Australia have undergone significant change over the last 20 years. During this time accreditation and governance around midwifery education has been reviewed and refined, moving from state to national jurisdiction. A major change has been the mandated inclusion of Continuity of Care Experiences as a clinical practice-based learning component., Aim: The purpose of this discussion is to present the history of the governance and accreditation of Australian midwifery programs. With a particular focus on the evolution of the Continuity of Care Experience as a now mandated clinical practice based experience., Methods: Historical and contemporary documents, research and grey literature, are drawn together to provide a historical account of midwifery programs in Australia. This will form the background to the inclusion of the Continuity of Care Experience and discuss research requirements to enhance the model to ensure it is educationally sound., Discussion: The structure and processes for the Continuity of Care Experience vary between universities and there is currently no standard format across Australia. As such, how it is interpreted and conducted varies amongst students, childbearing women, academics and midwives. The Continuity of Care Experience has always been strongly advocated for; however there is scant evidence available in terms of its educational theory underpinnings., Conclusion: Research concerned with the intended learning objectives and outcomes for the Continuity of Care Experience will support the learning model and ensure it continues into the future as an educationally sound learning experience for midwifery students., (Copyright © 2017 Australian College of Midwives. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

This paper is about the clinical principle of informed choice-the hallmark feature of the midwifery model of care in Ontario, Canada. Drawing on ethnographic history interviews with midwives, I trace the origins of the idea of informed choice to its roots in the social movement of midwifery in North America in the late 1960s and 1970s. At that time informed choice was not the distinctive feature of midwifery but was deeply embedded what I call midwifery's feminist experiment in care. But as midwifery in Ontario transitioned from a social movement to a full profession within the formal health care system, informed choice was strategically foregrounded in order to make the midwifery model of care legible and acceptable to a skeptical medical profession, conservative law makers, and a mainstream clientele. As mainstream biomedicine now takes up the rhetoric of patient empowerment and informed choice, this paper is at once a nuanced history of the making of the concept and also a critique of the ascendant 'regime of choice' in contemporary health care, inspired by the reflections of the midwives in my study for whom choice is impossible without care.

This paper provides a biographical outline of the career of Thomas Secker, MD, who from 1758-68 was Archbishop of Canterbury. Although much has been written on Secker, this study seeks to highlight his training in medicine, which has been largely overlooked hitherto by historians.

This is a book review turned research paper. The aim is to estimate the differences in the maternal mortality rate (MMR) between untrained midwives, expert midwives, and the famous obstetrician Dr Smellie in eighteenth-century Britain. The paper shows that the birth attendance practices of the expert midwife Mrs Stone and of Dr Smellie were very similar, though Stone used her hands whereas Smellie used forceps. Both applied the same invasive techniques to successfully deliver women with similar fatal complications, techniques that untrained midwives and most surgeons of the time could not perform. However, the same procedures, if used for normal births, would have increased the MMR. So, the key to the low MMR of both was that they kept interventions away from the majority of births that were normal. The paper quantifies the likely MMR for a 'Stone and Smellie style' birth attendance and concludes that the wider dissemination of their techniques can explain the decline in the British MMR.

Since the sixteenth century, competition between midwives and surgeons has created a culture of blame around the difficult delivery. In the late seventeenth century, 100 years before oxygen was discovered, researchers associated "apparent death of the newborn" with impaired respiratory function of the placenta. The diagnosis "birth asphyxia" replaced the term "apparent death of the newborn" during the mass phobia of being buried alive in the eighteenth century. This shifted the interpretation from unavoidable fate to a preventable condition. Although the semantic inaccuracy ("pulselessness") was debated, "asphyxia" was not scientifically defined until 1992. From 1792 the diagnosis was based on a lack of oxygen. "Blue" and "white" asphyxia were perceived as different disorders in the eighteenth, and as different grades of the same disorder in the nineteenth century. In 1862, William Little linked birth asphyxia with cerebral palsy, and although never confirmed, his hypothesis was accepted by scientists and the public. Fetal well-being was assessed by auscultating heart beats since 1822, and continuous electronic fetal monitoring was introduced in the 1960s without scientific assessment. It neither diminished the incidence of birth asphyxia nor of cerebral palsy, but rather raised the rate of cesarean sections and litigation against obstetricians and midwives.

The article discusses competition between midwives and doctors offering birth-related services in the city of Rio de Janeiro from 1835 to 1900. The research analyzed minutes from meetings, textbooks on births, and terms from qualification examinations for physicians, surgeons, apothecaries, and midwives at the Rio de Janeiro Medical School (Faculdade de Medicina do Rio de Janeiro), as well as announcements by and advertisements for doctors and midwives in columns featuring advertisements and useful recommendations in the Jornal do Commercio newspaper. An increase in the number of delivery physicians, and their scientific discourses led midwives to feel an obligation to diversify their clientele, consequently establishing themselves and working in lower-class and inhospitable areas.

This article analyzes the role of doctors and activists in Chicago who successfully redefined the practice and politics of childbirth both locally and ultimately nationwide. It begins with the story of Joseph DeLee's Chicago Maternity Center, responsible for supervising over 100,000 home births between 1932 and 1972. Most of the mothers cared for by the Center were nonwhite, poor, and had little or no access to prenatal care, yet their babies had a far higher survival rate than the nationwide average. Thousands of medical students from all over the Midwest experienced their first deliveries not in hospitals, but in these homes. The article then addresses a very different demographic: a rising number of middle-class white families in the suburbs of Chicago who, beginning in the 1950s, opted for out-of-hospital births. Many of them learned about home birth through their involvement in La Leche League, the breastfeeding organization formed in a Chicago suburb in 1956. Seemingly separated by class, race, and locale, the link between these two groups of home birthers was the philosophy and training in place at the Chicago Maternity Center., (© The Author 2017. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com.)

Midwifery in Dalmatia was highly undeveloped at the beginning of the XIX century. The health report from 1813 suggested that there were only 48 midwives in the whole province, and none of them with a degree from the midwifery school. After abolishing the Central Schools ("Ecoles Centrales"), which were founded at the time of French reign, and which had the university range, the professors who stayed in Zadar continued their work and teaching in the Midwifery School, which was founded in 1820 according to the decision made by Emperor Franz I, and started working in 1821. Since the school was working continuously for the whole century, a lot of professors and principals passed through. Protomedicus of Dalmatia officially performed the duty of principals of the Midwifery School. Their life and work biographies were gathered in this paper. Although the newcomers were mostly illiterate, very contemporary and valuable textbooks were used at that time. The professors of this school wrote some of these textbooks. This paper analyses those textbooks from the current medical science and praxis point of view, which points out to its significance and contribution of its authors to the reputation that the School enjoyed at that time.

Competing Interests: Interessenkonflikt: Der Autor gibt an, dass kein Interessenkonflikt besteht.

Background: The option of a planned home birth defies medical and social normativity across countries. In Denmark, despite the dramatic decline in the home birth rates between 1960 and 1980, the right to choose the place of birth was preserved. Little has been produced documenting this process., Aim: To present and discuss Susanne Houd's reflection on the history and social dynamics of home birth in Denmark, based in an in-depth interview., Methods: This paper is part of wider Short Term Scientific Mission (STSM), in which this interview was framed as oral history. The whole interview transcript is presented, keeping the highest level of detail., Findings: In Susanne Houd's testimony, four factors were highlighted as contributing to the decline in the rate of home births from the 1960s to the 1970s: new maternity hospitals; the development of obstetrics as a research-based discipline; the compliance of midwives; and a shift in women's preference, favouring hospital birth. The development of the Danish home birth models was described by Susanne Houd in regard to the processes associated with the medicalisation of childbirth, the role of consumers, and the changing professional dynamics of midwifery., Conclusion: An untold history of home birth in Denmark was documented in this testimony. The Danish childbirth hospitalisation process was presented as the result of a complex interaction of factors. Susanne Houd's reflections reveal how the concerted action of consumers and midwives, framed as a system-challenging praxis, was the cornerstone for the sustainability of home birth models in Denmark., (Copyright © 2016 Australian College of Midwives. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Women were allowed to practice the medical profession during the Byzantine Empire. The presence of female physicians was not an innovation of the Byzantine era but actually originated from ancient Greece and Rome. The studies and the training of women doctors were apparently equivalent to those of their male colleagues. The principal medical specialties of the female doctors were gynecology and midwifery. Byzantine legislation treated relatively equally both female and male doctors. For this reason, it can be assumed that the presence of female doctors was correlated with the position of women in Byzantine society. However, there is not sufficient information in the literature to clarify whether female and male doctors used to earn equal payment for the same service.

The midwifery profession can be traced back over thousands of years. Globally, midwives have expressed noticeable changes to their role over the years, and the impact on childbearing women (Larsson et al 2009; Mavalankar and Vora 2008; Dickerson et al 2014). During this time the midwifery profession has battled continuously against external pressures and this, in turn, has shaped the role of the midwife and the midwifery profession as a whole. This article will provide an insight into the history of midwifery; the challenges both midwives and the midwifery profession have faced; how these challenges have changed; and how this has assisted the development of the 'modern day midwife'. Of course this could not be discussed without acknowledging the continuing impact on childbearing women in the United Kingdom and globally.

This article analyzes the national discourse over "the problem" of midwifery in medical literature and examines the impact of this dialogue on Rhode Island from 1890 to 1940. Doctors did not speak as a monolithic bloc on this "problem": some blamed midwives while others impugned poorly trained physicians. This debate led to curricula reform and to state laws to regulate midwifery. The attempt to eliminate midwives in the 1910s failed because of a shortage of trained obstetricians, and because of cultural barriers between immigrant and mainstream communities. A decrease in immigration, an increase in trained obstetricians, the growing notion of midwives as relics of an outdated past, and the emergence of insurance plans to cover "modern" hospital births led to a decline in midwifery.

When in 1747 Dr Peter Chamberlen wrote in his apologia, 'A Voice in Rhama', that he was nursed up (as from the Cradle) to all Parts of Physick, and that in Asclepiad-Families, he was not referring simply to his father and uncle, the Peters (Younger and Elder) Chamberlen of obstetric forceps' fame. They were surgeons and accoucheurs; his mother's family counted clergymen as well as physicians and apothecaries among their number and the young Peter must indeed have grown up in a family steeped in both medical practice and religious study. Both families were refugees from the religious terrors of sixteenth century France, arriving in England in the second half of the reign of Elizabeth l. Both were to find fortune and royal patronage as they became established in their new lives. One was to found a medical dynasty that lasted through five generations, the other to produce a generation whose varied accomplishments died as the eldest son outlived all his siblings, only one of whose children became an apothecary - and he was to predecease his uncle. This is a brief biography of these two families, bound together by the ties of marriage, profession, faith and nationality., (© The Author(s) 2014.)