This webinar is hosted by ACM Midwifery advisor, Tani Paxton and features Jodie Atkinson from Maternity Service of the Year 2023, North Metropolitan Health Service Midwifery Graduate Program.

Presenters
North Metropolitan Health Service Midwifery Graduate Program
The winner of the 2023 ACM Maternity Service of the year for 2023 is the North Metropolitan Health Service Midwifery Graduate Program. The midwifery graduate program offers outstanding opportunities for newly qualified midwives to experience a wide scope of clinical practice opportunities and gain exposure to the full gambit of career pathways across women’s health continuum. The program continues to build capacity in placement offerings across the service from early pregnancy complications in the Emergency Centre to developing knowledge in speciality clinics such as Diabetes and the Women and Newborn Drug and Alcohol Service. Placements in mental health at the Mother Baby Unit and high dependency care in the Adult Special Care Unit and Special Care Nursery ensure the Women and Newborn Health Service is growing a workforce capable of meeting consumer need. Innovative programming to address the national midwifery workforce shortages has seen the program more than double its intake from 24 graduates in 2019, to 60 in 2023. This program is dynamic, innovative and demonstrates its ongoing capacity and commitment to inspiring a fledging work force by offering unique opportunities for growth. 92% of graduates from the most recent program remained within the health service and all have remained within midwifery, reflecting that the support and scope fulfilment the program offers retains graduates as they transition out of the program.

Jodie Atkinson
Jodie Atkinson is a Registered Nurse and Midwife and has a Masters in Health Professions Education. She is a Midwife Educator and currently coordinates the Graduate Midwifery Program and midwifery student planning at Women and Newborn Health Service in Western Australia. Jodie is the current Chair of the WA ACM branch. She is passionate about supporting the wellbeing of all midwives and supporting and developing student and graduate midwives to work to their full scope of practice across the continuum of midwifery care in all areas, to build a strong future midwifery workforce.