To mark the centenary of the Midwives (Ireland) Act 1918 and the first sitting of the Central Midwives Board of Ireland on 1st October of that year, a conference will take place in the Pillar Room to discuss historical and contemporary perspectives in midwifery in 2018.
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Conference Programme
8.30 Registration
9.00 Welcome: Professor Fergal Malone, Master of the Rotunda Hospital
Opening address: Fiona Hanrahan, Director of Midwifery and Nursing, Rotunda Hospital
The conference will be opened by Simon Harris, T.D., Minister for Health
9.45 Pre twentieth century maternity. Chair: Catherine Cox, Director, Centre for the History of Medicine in Ireland, University College Dublin
Changing childbirth in eighteenth century Ireland. – Mike Geary, Rotunda Hospital
“A fat pompous old woman, ignorant, and illiterate”: popular midwifery in nineteenth century Ireland. – Laurence Geary, University College Cork
Breastfeeding in nineteenth-century Irish workhouses. Judy Bolger, Trinity College Dublin
11.05 Tea & Coffee
11.20 Motherhood supported. Chair: Anne O’ Byrne, Head Librarian, Rotunda Hospital.
Women’s views and experiences of having their mental health needs considered in the perinatal period. – Ursula Nagle, Rotunda Hospital
The prevalence of anxiety in pregnancy and at three months postpartum, as reported by nulliparous women in Ireland. Louise Rafferty, Rotunda Foundation
“Treasure Hunting” – establishing a midwife-led foetal growth assessment clinic to identify the high-risk foetus in the low-risk pregnancy. – Heather Watson, Belfast HSC Trust
Getting ready for baby – group-based antenatal care and education. – Denise Boulter, Public Health Agency, Belfast
12.55 Lunch
13.40 The newly registered midwife and maternal care. Chair: Harriet Wheelock, Keeper of Collections, Heritage Centre, Royal College of Physicians of Ireland
Municipal gospel or necessity? Belfast Corporation and the regulation of midwives, 1911-1918. – Philomena Gorey, University College Dublin
The first Central Midwives Board of Ireland (1918-1923): impact and change. – Ann Louise Mulhall, Coombe Women and Infants University Hospital
Delivering the district. Nurse Anne Lynch, Midwife to Oldcastle, Co. Meath, in the first decades of the new Irish State. – Anne MacLellan, James Connolly Memorial Hospital, Anne Marie Meenan, Coombe Women and Infants University Hospital
Midwives and antenatal care: the boundaries of responsibility. – Janet Greenlees, Glasgow Caledonian University
15.15 Tea and Coffee
15.30 Maternal health, social policy and birth control. Chair: Dawn Johnston, Director of Midwifery, Nursing and Midwifery Board of Ireland
Midwives voices in Irish maternity care policy documents: the Mother and Infant Scheme. – Margaret Dunlea, Trinity College, Dublin
Family planning in the Rotunda Hospital, c.1961-1972. – Deirdre Foley, Dublin City University
Recruiting, training and supervising Maternity Peer Supporters to enhance perinatal care of migrant women within a multisite feasibility study. – Catherine Burke, The ORAMMA project, Sheffield Hallam University
Midwives voices in Irish maternity care: contemporary developments. – Malgorzata Stach, Trinity College, Dublin
17.00 Conference closing.