General introduction | 13 under supervision of an obstetrician. In medium and high risk-situations, the midwife decides whether and when to involve the obstetrician. As an illustration of NQMs, we created two different personas in the text below: Mirthe, a community-based NQM and Annabel, a hospital-based NQM. Mirthe is a 25-year-old NQM raised in a suburban region in the Northern part of the Netherlands. She recently graduated as a midwife and used to live in the city of Groningen. She now lives with her partner in the region where she was born and raised. Before graduation, she expected to work as a member of a community practice close to her friends and family. In reality, she is working as a locum midwife for three different practices, one of which is near her own home. When she is on-call she cannot always sleep in her own bed. While working, she enjoys the work with pregnant women, and meeting her fellow midwives. She finds it hard not to think about her work during her time off. She is constantly rethinking her decisions. Because of the different practices she works for, she finds it difficult to make connections with colleagues in the area and with the hospital’s collaborators. She also finds it difficult to work in different regions: each region has its own protocols. She also has no guarantees about the number of shifts she will be hired for in the upcoming months. Currently, she feels a bit disappointed about the conditions in which she has to work as a locum midwife. Annabel is currently working as a hospital-based midwife in a teaching hospital in the Randstad, the most densely populated area in the Netherlands. She works in a team with 15 fellow midwives. She chose to work in the hospital for the challenges in the work: complexity of midwifery care, working in a multidisciplinary team and working according to a timetable. Working 8 or 12-hour shifts is a work condition that she prefers. Annabel is 29 years old, recently graduated as a midwife, and previously obtained a Master’s degree in English literature. Before graduation, Annabel expected to work alongside fellow midwives. She was expecting to learn and develop herself as a midwife by sharing experiences. Her team members value her for her openness to learning and developing as a midwife and for her social skills. They describe Annabel as a nice person who can ‘talk to anyone’. Currently, she is a little disappointed with her work. Colleague midwives are usually not available to discuss cases. She also finds it difficult to work in the different roles that are expected of her in the hospital. She likes working in a team, but it is difficult to feel she belongs because she always has her temporary employment contract in the back of her mind.
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MTk4NDMw