Job Spotlight
How to become a Midwife
Midwives are healthcare professionals who specialise in pregnancy, labour, and birth, providing antenatal and postnatal advice. They monitor, care for and support women and their babies, as well as their partners and families.
Midwives may work in hospitals (in wards, delivery suites, clinics, operating theatres, or special baby care units), in the homes of expectant and new mums, or community clinics. They are part of a care team and often work with other midwives and nurses, doctors and surgeons, social workers, and health visitors.
If you’re great with people, love babies and are looking for a diverse and challenging career that’s all about creating connections, forging trust and multitasking, midwifery could be worth considering.
About you:
- Excellent people skills, kind, caring, and compassionate
- Passionate about helping people
- Good communication and observation skills
- Organised and able to multi-task without losing focus
- Willing to work long hours and do shift work
- Can remain calm and positive in stressful situations
- Strong emotional intelligence and mental strength
- Enjoys working in a team environment
- Committed
The job:
- Examining and monitoring pregnant women
- Assessing care requirements and writing care plans
- Undertaking antenatal care in hospitals, homes and GP practices
- Referring women and their babies on to doctors or other specialists and services if required
- Performing screening tests
- Providing information, emotional support and reassurance to women and their partners
- Taking patient samples, pulses, temperatures and blood pressures
- Caring for and assisting women in labour
- Monitoring and administering medication, injections and intravenous infusions during labour
- Monitoring the foetus during labour
- Advising and supporting parents about the daily care of their newborn babies including breastfeeding
- Helping parents to cope with traumatic births, sick babies, miscarriage, termination, stillbirth and neonatal death
- Writing records
- Tutoring student midwives
- Identifying risks in pregnancies, labour and postnatal situations
Lifestyle Impact: Medium
- Part Time opportunities: High – around 61% of Midwives work part-time (source: labourmarketinsights.gov.au).
- Average hours for full-time workers: 42 hours a week, which is average (source: labourmarketinsights.gov.au).
- Midwives’ salary (median) $68,000* per year (source: ato.gov.au). *Salaries vary depending on your skills and experience.
- Future career growth: Very strong (source: labourmarketinsights.gov.au).
- You will be mostly working indoors, in settings such as hospitals, private clinics, and even a patient’s home.
- More than a third of workers reported regularly working overtime or extra hours (source: labourmarketinsights.gov.au). You will also likely need to do shift work.
Midwives are most in demand in these locations:
Midwives are needed all across Australia, with high demand for healthcare workers in rural and regional areas. Most Midwives work in the Health Care and Social Assistance industry.
How to become a Midwife
You will need to complete an approved university-level qualification and register with the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (Ahpra).
Step 1 – Complete Year 12 with a focus on English and Maths. Biology, Chemistry, and Health may also be useful
Step 2 – Study an approved university-level qualification, usually a Bachelor of Midwifery. You can see a full list of approved qualifications here.
Step 3 – Apply for general registration as a Midwife with Ahpra. You can find out more about this here.
Step 4 – Start working as a qualified Midwife.
Step 5 – Consider undertaking further training and endorsements.
Find out more here –
https://www.nursingmidwiferyboard.gov.au/
Similar Careers to Midwife
Nurse
Doctor
Aged Care Worker
Early Childhood Educator
Gynaecologist
Nanny/Au Pair
Find out more about alternative careers.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
What options are there for career progression?
There are extra qualifications and training you can take after becoming a Midwife to further your skills. You might also like to consider moving into a different field, such as nursing, or even upskilling to become a Doctor.
Do I need to go to university to become a Midwife?
Yes, you will need to complete a university-level qualification and register with Ahpra in order to practise as a Midwife in Australia.
Where do Midwives work?
Midwives don’t just work in hospitals; they can also work in private and specialist clinics, in community health services, and more.
What are 3 things I can do right now to help me become a Midwife?
If you’re in high school and you’d like to find out if a career as a Midwife is right for you, here’s a few things you could do right now:
- Consider studying a health-based VET qualification while at school – this will give you a head-start on your studies and could even be used to gain entry to a university degree in some cases.
- See if you can find work experience in any health-based setting, such as a hospital, doctor’s office, aged care home, or community health clinic. This will help you build valuable skills and get a taste for a career in this field.
Talk to a Midwife to see what a day in their life is like. If you don’t know anyone, see if you can watch videos or documentaries about a career in construction or as a Midwife.