One
Purchase Your Birth Journey: A Holistic Guide for Pregnancy, the centerpiece for group prenatal care and private visits.
Create a sustainable midwifery practice!
If you envision sustainable midwifery care, start using group prenatal care in your practice. Midwives facilitating group care will spend approximately half the time per year in prenatal appointments than midwives who provide private one-on-one care without compromising quality time with a mother. The system has been tested in a home birth practice for twelve years. It works!
Birth Social is designed as a self-study program meant to guide midwives and students through setting up a successful group prenatal model of care. You set your own time, pace, and goals for tracking your progress. It is a turnkey system ready to implement once you complete the following steps:
Three Steps
Two
Purchase and complete the steps in the 180-page manual, Birth Social Program: Sustainable Manual for Midwives.
Three
Purchase the supporting documents bundle, the foundation that makes group care work.
When you purchase the Birth Social Program, you get the years of experience, wisdom, and knowledge it took to develop a repeatable group prenatal program for home birth and birth center midwives.
What you will learn
- A good foundation in the theory, philosophy, and model of Birth Social.
- A sound understanding of the process of Birth Social group prenatal care, including organizing your office, schedules, paperwork, space, and lifestyle for conducting group care.
- A comprehension of facilitation and story-telling skills. You will love interacting with your clients in a different way. You are now building a community!.
- An understanding of integrating the book, Your Birth Journey: a Holistic Guide for Pregnancy, into the group practice model.one
Chapter Outline
Chapter One: Getting Started
- Self-Study Guidelines
- Your Group Care Space
- Materials and Resources
- Additional Midwifery Supplies
- Develop a Strategy
Chapter Two: Sustainability
- Concepts of Sustainability
- Birth Social Foundation
- Sustainable Midwifery Practice
- Shifting Your Focus
- The Concept of Burnout
- The Martyr Midwife
- Boundary Alerts
Chapter Three: The Chemical World
- Environmental Health
- Paradigm Shift
- Multiple Chemical Sensitivity (MCS)
- Fragrance-Free in the Modern World
- Fragrance Policy
Chapter Four: Scheduling
- Practice Considerations
- Selecting Days for Groups
- Calendar Method Madness
- The Formula
- Creating Schedules from the Calendar
- Parent Schedules
Chapter Five: The Business of Midwifery
- Sustainable Office Hours
- Scheduling Conflicts
- When Clients Need Extra Attention During Group
- Communication
Chapter Six: The Heart of Group Care
- Creating a Client Chart
- Checklist
- The Prenatal Form
- Teaching Self-Care
- The Private Visit
- The Five-Minute Belly Check
- Midwife Charting
- Follow-Up Charting
- After the Belly Check
Chapter Seven: Sorting It All Out
- Gathering Your Documents
- The Process of Sorting
- Educational Material
- Practice Documents
- Informed Consents
- Client Concerns
- Client Permissions
- Birth Journey Templates
Cha[ter Eight: The Initial Visit
- Preparing for the Initial Visit
- Helpful Paperwork
- The Initial Visit Folder
- Signing Informed Consents in Group
- Reviewing “Your Birth Journey”
- Early Pregnancy Care and Planning
Chapter Nine: New Concepts
- Consult Plan
- Integrating Birth Social with Private Care
Chapter Ten: Facilitation
- Facilitating Birth Social
- The Magic of Facilitation – It’s Magic
Chapter Eleven: Storytelling
- The Art of Storytelling
- Navigate Between Fact and Story
The next eight lessons center on using facilitation and story-telling skills in the Chapters of Your Birth Journey: a Holistic Guide for Pregnancy. The topics listed under each chapter do not include all the topics covered in the book. Instead, we select a handful of topics to help you find your bearing when facilitating group care.
Chapter Twelve: Facilitating A Healthy Pregnancy
- Introductions
- Health Tips
Chapter Thirteen: Facilitating Nurturing Baby
- Co-sleeping
- Breastfeeding
Chapter Fourteen: Facilitating Parenting Decisions
- Finding a Pediatrician
- Circumcision
- Vaccinations
Chapter Fifteen: Facilitating Birth and Postpartum Prep
- Gathering Supplies
- Support
Chapter Sixteen: Facilitating Call the Midwife
- When to Call the Midwife
- Broken Water
- Stages of Labor
Chapter Seventeen: Facilitating What If
- Complication Levels
- Transport
- Processing Complications
Chapter Eighteen: Facilitating Postpartum
- Postpartum Instructions
- Newborn Assessment
Chapter Nineteen: Facilitating Waiting for Baby
- The Waiting Game
- Bishops Score
Chapter Twenty: Wrapping it Up
- Staying on Track
- Where in the Book
- Guidelines and Protocols
- Post-Session Visits
Chapter Twenty-One: Completion
- Questionnaire
- Journal Questions
take the next steps
Purchase the Birth Social Manual for Midwives
Purchase the parent book, Your Birth Journey
Purchase Birth Social supporting documents
Participant Feedback
Jessica Johnston, CPM
It was truly kismet that Birth Social and I collided. I was feeling called to integrate a group care approach into my midwifery practice, and within a week of speaking it to the world, I met Carolyn and joined the Birth Social group. With Birth Social, I went from running frantic between clinic and home visits to a streamlined practice where I hand mothers their schedule of care at the first appointment. I can now complete up to 40 prenatals in 14 hours, and my moms are getting MORE education and connection than ever! The sustainability of group care for a midwife is phenomenal, and the quality of care my moms receive has substantially increased because they aren’t turning to just me for answers – they are turning to each other as well. I cannot even fathom returning to individual care practice. It robs mothers of the social childbirth experience that is inherent to a well-rounded care experience. And now my family gets the benefit of more of my time and undivided attention. Thank you Carolyn for pioneering this fantastic approach. The Midwives Model of Care makes the midwife the sacrifice, and you are unwinding that paradox and giving midwives back their time and wellness. Cheers to you from us all!
Bethany McKinnon, CPM
I was introduced to the Birth Social Model of Care while working with Carolyn during my apprenticeship. When I opened up my own practice and birth center in Oregon, I returned to this model after months of private care. I will never turn back. What this does for my practice is allows me to take care of myself and take care of my clients better. I can take 30-60min before the group and refresh myself with each client coming in and any issues that I need to follow-up with. When I was doing private care, I did not feel that I had enough time to chart, check-in, and follow up with each client in the ways I do now. My clients enjoy the camaraderie of group care and many of them continue their friendships after my postpartum care is complete. Birth Social is truly building a birth community and providing sustainability and longevity to midwifery!
Shalmai Hollingshead, CPM
The group model of prenatal care was my first introduction to midwifery visits. I was fortunate to apprentice with my mother, Carolyn Reisman, who developed and used the Birth Social program. I knew that it was different than private prenatal care, but I wouldn’t fully understand just how much until the pandemic struck. When Covid struck, I finally understood how not having group prenatal care would impact my personal and professional life. After dissolving the groups due to Covid, I was busier and more stressed than ever before. I had less personal and family time, and I felt exhausted at the end of each day. I was going over the same information separately with each client that I would have done together. I began to miss groups, especially for the organization and time management. The families were also missing out. I observed families develop kinship, support, and community ties in their groups. Some found close friends, others just acquaintances, but most gained meaningful connections that otherwise would not have been possible.
By the end of 2021, I felt comfortable starting group prenatal again. Now I have more time to review charts, faxes, research, catch up on emails, create documents, and do various things that I had been putting off. I would never go back to doing private visits on a full-time basis. I know I will be doing group care for the duration of my midwifery career. I believe in the powerful connections formed and peer-to-peer learning in a group. I genuinely believe that it is the most essential element of sustainable practice in midwifery