Expanding Midwifery Practice Through Calmbirth Education

At a time when Australia’s maternity system is marked by rising intervention rates and increasing reports of birth trauma, the role of the midwife has never been more critical or more in need of expansion. Calmbirth education offers a meaningful, evidence-based and informed pathway for midwives to extend their scope of practice beyond clinical tasks into the emotional, psychological and relational dimensions of birth.

The International Confederation of Midwives (ICM) defines midwifery scope of practice as working in “partnership with women to give necessary support, care and advice during pregnancy, labour and the postnatal period…” (ICM, 2024). It includes practices that are preventative and promote physiological birth, while keeping mothers and babies safe and knowing when to escalate care when needed (ICM 2024). Calmbirth education enables midwives to add to and expand this scope through structured psycho-emotional preparation for families. It allows midwives to formally integrate the mind–body principles into their practice, strengthening their ability to influence birth outcomes through relational and emotional care.

With a 36% caesarean rate for first-time mothers (AIHW, 2025), a 43% induction rate (AIHW, 2025), and one in three women reporting birth trauma (Keedle et al, 2022), our current maternity landscape can reasonably be described as risk-averse, task-oriented and heavily obstetric-led. Hospitals remain the primary place of birth for most families, and their policies and procedures often shape care in ways that prioritise efficiency and risk management over emotional wellbeing. Within this structure, midwives frequently work under pressure, navigating the competing demands of working to policy while providing woman and family centred care. Calmbirth education can provide midwives with a framework to reclaim and expand their professional influence within this environment. Shand et al (2022) found that couples attending a psychoprophylaxis-based antenatal program (which was Calmbirth) demonstrated a trend toward higher spontaneous labours and vaginal birth and lower rates of intervention (Shand et al., 2022).

Antenatal fear and anxiety are well-established risk factors for poor birth experiences (Ruger-Navarrete et al., 2023). Evidence suggests that antenatal education focused on psychosocial and emotional preparation may reduce intervention rates (Cutajar et al., 2020; Saxbe et al., 2018; Tabib & Crowther, 2018). Calmbirth aligns with this evidence by equipping midwives with the skills to help birthing families build resilience, reduce fear, and enhance their sense of control and agency during labour. This shift has profound implications. When women feel informed, confident and emotionally supported, they are more likely to engage in shared decision-making, actively making the right decisions for them, including accepting necessary interventions when needed without trauma, emerging from birth feeling physically safe and emotionally intact. Calmbirth couples in the Auckland study reported feeling empowered, confident and positively reframed about childbirth following Calmbirth education (Crowther et al., 2024).

Crowther et al, (2021) reported that Calmbirth couples felt more prepared, “having a sense of control and agency over their childbirth experience, and increased self-efficacy”. Other research suggests that a woman’s self-efficacy and personalised decision-making are enhanced when care providers and birth partners understand her unique coping strategies (Warriner et al., 2018). Calmbirth enables midwives to cultivate a deeper understanding of birth and in doing so, they can actively influence how families enter and experience birth from an emotional and psychological perspective.

Calmbirth education represents more than an antenatal course. It is a professional extension of midwifery practice, one that integrates psycho-spiritual insight with physiological understanding. In doing so, it offers a powerful response to rising intervention rates and birth trauma, while reaffirming the central role of the midwife in protecting both the emotional wellbeing and physical safety of birthing families.

In a maternity system often characterised by fragmentation, Calmbirth creates a protected space where informed decisions, self-advocacy and partnership can flourish. It strengthens the midwife’s role as truly holding space for the families they care for, deepening the quality and intention of care. Calmbirth recognises the inseparable connection between emotional state and physiological function, a connection long understood within our midwifery philosophy.

Published in the Australian Midwifery News Autumn Issue 2026 

Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) (2025). Australia’s mothers and babies report Web Report 28 Nov 25

https://www.aihw.gov.au/reports/mothers-babies/australias-mothers-babies/contents/about

Crowther S., Hollingshed B., McAra-Couper J., Donald H., & Hotchin C. (2024) Independent qualitative evaluative study of Calmbirth antenatal classes. Journal of Perinatal Education, 0(0), 1-11,

http://dx.doi.org/10.189/JPE-2024-0009

Crowther S, McAra-Couper J, Hollingshead B, Donald H, Hotchin C (2021) Service Evaluation of the Calmbirth Antenatal Programme at Auckland District Health Board (ADHB) 2020-21. Report available on request from [email protected] or [email protected]

Cutajar, L., Miu, M., Fleet, J. A., Cyna, A. M., & Steen, M. (2020). Antenatal education for childbirth: Labour and birth. European journal of midwifery, 4, 11.

https://doi.org/10.18332/ejm/120002

Internation Confederation of Midwives (ICM) 2024 “Scope of Practice” https://internationalmidwives.org/resources/international-definition-of-the-midwife/

Keedle H., Bell B., Keedle W., & Dahlen H. (2022) O79 – Factors contributing to women’s experiences of birth trauma in Australia. Women and Birth, Volume 35, Supplement 1, ISSN 871-5192,

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.wombi.2022.07.085.

Rúger-Navarrete, A., Vázquez-Lara, J. M., Antúnez-Calvente, I., Rodríguez-Díaz, L., Riesco-González, F. J., Palomo-Gómez, R., Gómez-Salgado, J., & Fernández-Carrasco, F. J. (2023). Antenatal Fear of Childbirth as a Risk Factor for a Bad Childbirth Experience. Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland), 11(3), 297.

https://doi.org/10.3390/healthcare11030297

Saxbe, D., Rossin-Slater, M., & Goldenberg, D. (2018). The transition to parenthood as a critical window for adult health. The American psychologist, 73(9), 1190–1200.

https://doi.org/10.1037/amp0000376

Tabib, M., & Crowther, S. (2018). Service Evaluation of Relaxation Workshops for Pregnant Women. The Journal of perinatal education, 27(1), 10–19.

https://doi.org/10.1891/1058-1243.27.1.10

Warriner S., Crane C., Dymond M., Krusche A. (2018) An evaluation of mindfulness-based childbirth and parenting courses for pregnant women and prospective fathers/partners within the UK NHS (MBCP-4 NHS), Midwifery, Volume 64, 2018, Pages 1-10, ISSN 0266-6138,

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0266613818301372