Frontline Midwife

Emma — Thu, 12 May 2022 00:00:00 +0000

‘Extraordinary, profoundly moving, all-consuming . . . I haven’t stopped thinking about Frontline Midwife since I finished reading it’ Oliver Burkeman, author of Four Thousand Weeks‘The heart-wrenching tale of one midwife’s quest to help others – and make peace with herself’Leah Hazard, author of Hard Pushed‘Brutally powerful . . . Totally absorbing’ IndependentThis is a story of women in crisis, seen through the eyes of a remarkable midwife ‘My own suffering, my own loneliness, was a fair price to pay for the lives we’d saved. And now here I am, training to be a midwife, so that next time I can make it better.’Anna Kent has delivered babies in war zones, caring for the most vulnerable women in the most vulnerable places in the world. At twenty-six years old, not yet a fully-trained midwife, she delivered a baby in a tropical storm by the light of a headtorch; the following year, she would be responsible for the female health of 30,000 Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh. But returning to the UK to work for the NHS, she soon learned that even at home the right to a safe birth was impossible to take for granted.In Frontline Midwife, Kent shares her extraordinary experiences as a nurse, midwife and mother, illuminating the lives of women that are irreparably affected by compromised access to healthcare. This is at once an astonishing story of the realities of frontline humanitarian work, and a powerful reminder of the critical, life-giving work of nurses and doctors at home and around the world.

The Secret Midwife

Emma — Thu, 22 Jul 2021 00:00:00 +0000

For fans of One Born Every Minute.The Secret Midwife is a heart-breaking, engrossing and important read. At once joyful and profoundly shocking, this is the story of birth, straight from the delivery room.Strongest supporter, best friend, expert, cheerleader and chief photographer . . . Before, during and after labour the role of a midwife is second to none. The Secret Midwife reveals the highs and lows on the frontline of the maternity unit, from the mother who tries to give herself a DIY caesarean to the baby born into witness protection, and from surprise infants that arrive down toilets to ones that turn up in the lift.But there is a problem; the system which is supposed to support the midwives and the women they care for is starting to crumble. Short-staffed, over worked and underappreciated – these crippling conditions are taking their toll on the dedicated staff doing their utmost to uphold our National Health Service, and the consequences are very serious indeed.

Midwifery – The Bell Bookshop

Frontline Midwife

The Secret Midwife