Midwives and maternal and child health: Building resource capacity

With dramatic changes in health, social services, and welfare systems and escalating pressure to increase clinical productivity, midwives need to enhance their capacity to work with federal, regional, and state partners to promote and protect comprehensive, culturally competent, and community-based quality health care for pregnant women and their families. Information about maternal and child health (MCH) regional and state resources is provided, and strategies for obtaining additional MCH resources are suggested, so that midwives and other women's health care providers can more effectively improve health care programs and systems that benefit women and their families. In addition, ways to work with MCH programs at the regional and state levels are described. (C) 2001 by the American College of Nurse-Midwives.