More than a midwife
So, what exactly does Women’s Health Care mean?
That is a big question indeed. Women’s Health Care includes education, prevention of problems or disease and testing and treating infections, conditions, or disease processes. For sure a loaded trunk of varied and often complex situations!
First on my list would be teen girl health care. Young teens are dealing with so much at a young age; hormones, body changes, body image changes, relationships with parents, peers and budding puppy love infatuations. That’s a whole boatload of physical and emotional baggage to carry around! Many mothers of young teens are doing a great job of educating and supporting their daughters, but that’s not always the case. Sadly, so many girls are in tough family situations and don’t have that love and care, they’re not taught about what their entire body is trying to do. They are “looking for love in all the wrong places”!
That’s where the nurse-midwife can make a positive impact. With positive encouragement, honest talking about what is happening, and straight-forward love and support, we can accomplish so much. This is entirely necessary for these young girls to develop a positive attitude about their own health and well-being. They can take this with themselves for a lifetime.
Young teen care includes talking, counseling, educating, doing testing or prescriptions as needed, and planning for the future. It can be a great first step in women taking care of themselves for the rest of their life! Mostly we just talk in a safe and comfortable environment where girls feel safe!
Next on the list is Well Woman Care. As the name implies, we take care of healthy women of all ages. This care also includes providing a safe place for wise counsel, help with relationships and intimacy concerns, and testing for infection or disease. We then follow up with appropriate treatment, referral and other appropriate interventions. We counsel women in substance abuse, loving them as we are truthful about the impact of this abuse in the future.
Woman's care options
i.e. bladder infections, colds
i.e bladder infections, colds
with STI tests
administration only/client brings in medication
Well Woman Care also includes Family Planning, also considered “family prevention” In an ideal world only the most loved and wanted babies would be born into the most stable families of the planet. This, however, is not the truth. Families today must be responsible for their own fertility, and in this arena, nurse-midwifery care is a great place to start!
Family Planning must start with truthful education about what is available today. Then we can prescribe or employ the woman’s method of choice.
At Canyon Midwifery these include oral contraceptives, Depo, and Nexplanon. We remove IUDs but do not insert them.
Family planning options
i.e. bladder infections, colds
i.e bladder infections, colds
with STI tests
administration only/client brings in medication
The last aspect of women’s health care is that of peri-menopause and post-menopause. Just like with young teens, older women are dealing with similar issues: body image changes, emotional and relationship problems, intimacy concerns, and hormonal changes. As we age, we also need to screen for other diseases like breast and colon cancer. We need to see cardiologists since heart disease is a huge cause of death in women. This time in life is not for the faint of heart either. Our emotions might be crazy, our spouse might be looking at younger women, it may be impossible to work, we feel that our bodies are failing us on every front!
Again nurturing nurse-midwifery care is the answer. We can educate, love, support, counsel, refer, do testing and offer hormonal or more natural treatments for all these changes.
In closing: Women’s Health Care is NOT for pregnant women! But it’s for every other woman out there! Come see for yourself!