Midwifery education in Australia: Requirements for assessment

Abstract

Over several decades, national competency standards have been developed in Australia to define competence for midwives. Furthermore, national standards for the accreditation of the three year, Bachelor of Midwifery programme have been developed. Each standard has associated evaluative criteria such as minimum clinical requirements to determine if the standard has been met. Concerns have been raised regarding competency based approaches to midwifery education which may not incorporate national competency standards and, in particular, minimum clinical requirements for registration. Philosophically there has been a move by many of the registering bodies in Australia from competency based standards to a more prescriptive approach. For example, midwifery graduates seeking to register as a midwife are now required to demonstrate substantial birthing experience as a pre-requisite for registration. However, the current number of births required for registration purposes is unsupported by evidence and appears to be based on custom and tradition. It is essential that any midwifery practice requirements are based on evidence based research in order for the profession to be guided by evidence based outcomes. It is the purpose of this paper to present a systematic review of the evidence for incorporating minimum clinical requirements as an appropriate assessment criterion for registration.