the role of midwife from the perspective of midwives, obstetricians and women: a qualitative study

Background & aim: a midwife as a responsible and professional person provides a wide range of services to women. in iran, the position of midwives is challenging in terms of their professional roles and few studies have addressed this issue. the present study was conducted to explore the perceptions and experiences of midwives, obstetricians and women regarding the role of midwives. methods: this qualitative study was performed using conventional content analysis in shahrekord, iran in 2018.purposeful sampling was started and continued until reaching to the saturation of data. 23 semi-structured interviews were conducted with 21 participants. the maxqda-2018 software was used to analyze the data adopting graneheim landman’s approach. results: data analysis revealed three categories including 1) uncertain identity including five subcategories of midwife as a maternity care provider, a gynecologist assistant, a healthcare team member, an undecided health professional, a professional with overlapped duties 2) community-based educator including three subcategories of women and mothers health promoters, community’s fertility promoters, patient respondents, as well as 3) compassionate and empowered supporter, including three subcategories of women’s constant companion, underpaid supporter and unsupported advocate. conclusion: the results of this study showed that despite the fact that midwives play an important role in providing midwifery services, they suffer from the lack of job boundaries, low income and lack of support. therefore, paying more attention to the identity of midwifery as an independent profession and restoring the midwife’s job authority is a necessity of the health system.