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Author	direct entry or dual degree???
Colz (offline) Joined: May 2010 Location: Brisbane Posts: 2	Sun Oct 10, 2010 6:10 pm Hi there, Im looking for some advice.. Is it better to just be a midwife.. or a midwife with nursing background??? Do you get more respect having a nursing background?? i have heard a few people say that midwives with no nursing kinda get shafted a bit.. Also do you get paid more if you have a nursing degree as well??? so far i have two choices i have applied for. 3 year direct entry into Midwifery at ACU OR 4 year dual degree nursing/midwifery through QUT.. Any advise or suggestions would be greatly appreciated! :)

jules74 (offline) Joined: Jan 2008 Location: Posts: 135	Oct 16, 2010, 04:42 pm im interested to hear peoples answers on this. ive also heard stories about midwives who arent nurses having issues occasionally with not being able to work on wards that might be combined maternity/gynae type wards. but that was way back when the Bach of Mid first started in Victoria about 8 or 9 yrs ago. it may have change or it may just have been hearsay too. could be totally wrong. i think you might get mixed reactions based on peoples own experiences. im about to finish an EN course and have applied to do another 2 years to get my bachelor of nursing, and im alss interested in mid as well as a couple of other areas- so for me, being a nurse first and then doing the mid is the best option. plus it means i can work as an EN while i do my 2 yrs of RN study, and then i can also work as an RN while i do a mid course if i definitely decide to do it down the track. i have a friend who has started the Bach Mid this year part time at ACU and she'll finish in 3 yrs time. if we end up both being midwives 4 or 5 yrs from now it'll be interesting to see what both of our experiences are. one of my EN classmates has asked 2 of our teachers who are nurses, but also midwives- and who only work in mid now- and from them the reaction was basically mixed. they said that there were positives for both options. but were probably leaning a bit more towards doing nursing first. but they definitely werent negating the idea of doing straight mid either. i guess if you have absolutely no interest in nursing, then the best option would be the Bach of MId, but if you have some interest in both then doing both is best- it covers all options and expands your opportunities. ive always been kind of interested in child and maternal health, and from what i can tell, to be a child and maternal health nurse you MUST be both a nurse AND a midwife. now im not 100% certain that this info is correct..... but from the little that ive looked into it in the past, that was the conclusion i came to. so if thats true, then for me it makes sense to be a nurse and a midwife. good luck with both options...exciting times ahead!

jamoz315 (offline) Joined: Oct 2010 Location: Posts: 1	Oct 20, 2010, 08:13 pm Last edited Oct 20, 2010, 08:13 pm update #1 Hi there, Ideally I would imagine it would be in your interest to do the double degree as this will give you more flexibility in the long run. However I don't believe it is harder to get a job, it just depends on the job you are going for! I spoke to a professor from a university that told me in some cases the direct entry midwives tend to get the job due to the fact that they may (not always) be cheaper to hire than the Div 1 midwives. In other cases the Div 1 will get preference as they want want him/her to cover shifts on other wards. Good luck with your future study! modified: Wednesday 20 October 2010 8:14:46 pm - jamoz315

Mumto3 (offline) Joined: Dec 2007 Location: Qld Posts: 5	Nov 03, 2010, 08:34 pm Hey Colz, I'm about to enter my 4th and final year of the dual degree in Nursing and Midwifery. My advice is do you want to be a midwife and not ever do nursing, if so then do the direct entry degree. I wasn't sure that I would like Midwifery, so did the dual as I got offered a place of only 20 at UQ in 2008. Otherwise I was going to go Nursing, and then do a post grad into Midwifery but as I was offered a place into the dual I took it. The direct entry Midwives have been given a bit of a hard time, and once the midwives we trained with found out I was a dual student I would be told 'oh you will be so glad you did that, you will know so much more'.... But really I don't think so. Nothing more than you could study for yourself anyway, or unless I decide to work a year prior as a nurse on the medical ward. Anyway, after a couple of years the Midwives got used to the Direct Entry students and now graduate Midwives and they are more accepted. Its the same as when University training first came in many years ago and so many Nurses took a while to accept that nurses were no longer hospital trained. Anyway my advice is unless you really know that you don't want to be a nurse (and you probably can't know that until you try it out, I loved all my nursing clinical placements by the way), and only want to do midwifery then go the direct entry route. If you don't mind studying for an extra year, and really want to discover what nursing is all about then do the dual degree. In our course the direct entry students can become Neonatal Nurses and work in SCN's and as from next year they will also be able to look after gynae women who are on the post natal floor in our hospital. Whatever you choose, good luck in your studies.

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direct entry or dual degree???