Arctic College set to deliver made-in-Nunavut midwives

SARA MINOGUE

Rachel Jones and Diane Tiktak are to become the first “made-in-Nunavut” midwives.

They are the first students to enter the midwifery training program launched last fall at Nunavut Arctic College in Rankin Inlet.

By June, they’ll be certified maternity care workers, able to work with new moms and babies and teaching the public about maternal health care.

Next fall, they go back to school to complete year two of the midwifery diploma program, where they’ll be supervised by a certified midwife, and will be certified themselves by the end of the year. Then they have just one more year to go, working as interns before they are able to start working on their own.

The goal is to bring birthing back to the communities – and ultimately help end, or reduce, the practice of sending women south to deliver babies.

“I was never much for women leaving their home towns to go and have their babies, because I’ve always looked at having babies as a very normal process, not an illness,” says Nowyah Williams, who has been working towards midwifery in Nunavut for the past 13 years.

Williams was hired as a maternity care worker at the Rankin Inlet birthing centre when it opened in 1993.

“I had dreams to become a certified midwife,” she said. But because it took so long to get training, she eventually moved on to the government department that got the job done, and is now the Government of Nunavut’s coordinator for regional maternal/newborn health services.

Explaining why she became interested in midwifery, she said, “My children were born in southern hospitals. When I had my baby for the first time, I never had any sort of education regarding labour and delivery, and so when I had my baby at the hospital, it was a shocking experience for me, because nobody ever talked to me about having a baby. But with the midwives, there’s an awful lot of education.”

Six more students are to enter the program this fall – three from Rankin Inlet and, ideally, three from Arviat.

Arviat has one of the highest birth rates in Nunavut, which is why it was selected to receive a new birthing centre, where the three midwives will eventually return, Williams said.

“Hopefully we can keep setting up birthing centers across Nunavut.”

That fits with Nunavut’s commitment, made by Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq in the legislature last November, to have more than two dozen people qualified to work in maternity care and midwifery by June 2008.

Williams has already seen the impact of the birthing centre on Rankin Inlet, where half of the babies delivered in 2000 were from surrounding communities. Before the opening of the centre, these mothers would have been sent south.

“People were very impressed with having a baby in Nunavut – so much closer to home. Especially people from Whale Cove and Chesterfield Inlet who were able to bring their own family members who were so close by,” Williams said.

“It becomes a very exciting event when you can bring your husband along. After all, they’re having a baby too, it’s just the woman who happens to be doing the delivery.”

Family units are stronger if the father is involved with the birth right from the beginning, Williams said.

“The bonding takes place right away. Even the little ones get so excited about having a new arrival that I can really witness the family growing stronger together.”

Two consultants have been hired to develop the course curriculum in Rankin Inlet, and to work on new policies for the resulting midwives.

Elders also contributed, through two meetings held in Rankin Inlet, which addressed the cultural components of delivering babies. That material will be included in the Inuktitut curriculum that is now being developed, and should be ready this fall.

Some of that curriculum could eventually be included in the aboriginal midwifery education program developed by the University College of the North, based in Manitoba.