Midwifery in Newcastle

Midwives are a vital presence during all stages of pregnancy, labour and the early postnatal period, preparing women for the delivery of new life.

Whilst the role is demanding and carries a high level of responsibility it is hugely rewarding bringing great levels of satisfaction.

We offer exciting opportunities for midwives working in the Royal Victoria Infirmary’s maternity services. The unit was rated outstanding in the most recent CQC inspection where we oversee around 6500 births every year, 1400 of which arrive in our welcoming, co-located midwifery-led Newcastle Birthing Centre.

Our midwives work in a number of healthcare settings, both on the maternity unit and in the community. They act as the lead health professional and contact, providing evidence-based care and supporting women in making informed choices about the options and services available throughout pregnancy and the birthing continuum.

Expertise on pregnancy and childbirth

Our midwives’ responsibilities are diverse providing:

comprehensive antenatal care from booking, including parent education, clinical examinations and screening
care for women and supporting them during labour and the birthing process
responsibility as the lead clinician for low-risk women
identification of deviation from low-risk pathways, ensuring appropriate referral
collaborative working as part of the specialist multi-disciplinary team
specialist infant feeding advice aligned to parental choice
partnership working with women acting as their advocate

The diversity of the women we care for includes those who are socially excluded, have disabilities and some who may be very young.

Our care also extends to refugees or homeless women and their families who may be from differing cultural or religious backgrounds, where high levels of empathy and intuition are important.

Working with women from such a variety of backgrounds requires confidence in communicating with different people in different ways, and a great understanding of the emotional, physical, and psychological processes of pregnancy and birth.

Working autonomously and as part of a team

Our midwives mainly deal with women who are healthy but require professional support and advice to help them throughout pregnancy, labour, and the postnatal period.

Sometimes pregnancies are complex in nature, requiring high degrees of multi-professional management in the care provided.

Our midwives are pivotal in offering support and advice to women who experience adverse events and pride themselves in having excellent interpersonal skills, enabling them to form good relationships with families, and the ability to communicate effectively as a member of the multi-disciplinary team, ensuring that high standards of safe care are delivered.

You will work with members of your team on a roster-based system with a potential to be on-call to provide care at the woman’s home as well as in hospital.

What opportunities are available?

We provide a comprehensive range of services from low risk to highly complex care for women and babies which are inclusive of four community midwifery teams. This provides midwives working in the Trust diverse professional experiences and makes clinical practice both exciting and challenging.

All newly registered and new to post midwives receive a comprehensive preceptorship programme on appointment and a designated Band 7 Team Lead. Midwives will also be allocated a named Professional Midwifery Advocate (PMA) who can provide additional support along with the PMA Team.

This helps with orientation into all clinical areas, develop the required knowledge, clinical skills and competencies. This is supported and facilitated by our team of Practice Support Midwives.

We have teams of Research and Specialist Midwives who are an educational resource and provide clinical support for midwives and these roles offer great opportunities for career progression at the right time

We also have a large team of support staff including theatre nurses, nursery nurses, midwifery support workers and health care assistants.

How do we recruit?

All midwifery vacancies are advertised here. Interview dates are included on the adverts. It is unlikely interviews can be provided on alternative dates.

Band 5 and Band 6 posts are usually advertised together. The posts, unless stated, would be for rotational posts providing antenatal, intrapartum and postnatal hospital and community care.

Band 7 posts would be for a specific clinical area. Part of the recruitment process would include Strength Based Recruitment.

Each vacancy will have a named contact should applicants have any specific queries.

Can I visit?

If you have not worked in the Trust before we would encourage you to come and look around the unit in advance of your interview. To do this, please contact the named contact on the job advert and we will be happy to arrange this for you.