Waimea Weekly Locally Owned and Operated
Wednesday 28 October 2020
Country is coming to town Page 4
Page 21
sweepstake liftout
Shortage of local midwives
Lap records tumble
Jenny Nicholson
The recommended caseload for midwives is being exceeded due to a shortage of professionals in the Nelson Tasman region. The recommendation comes from the Ministry of Health that a midwife’s caseload does not exceed 50-60 clients per year, according to local midwife Wendy Degroot. “This puts pressure on midwives. Because they care, they will fit more in,” says Wendy. After 18 years working in the community, being on-call day and night, Wendy is one of several midwives retiring this year. Adding to large case-loads and pressures of business negotiations, the social distancing of lockdown made this year more challenging. “It was crazy. Workload doubled,” said Wendy. Midwives spent days on the phone reassuring families, knowing it was a particularly anxious time for first time mothers. The shortage of local midwives has been partially solved by the District Health Board employing a team of four for one year. During that time, they hope to attract more Lead Maternity Carers, midwives who work in the community, to the area. Toni James, part of that team of four, said that they will be using a similar model to the community midwives, working in pairs with a lead midwife and a back-up midwife for each client. “Once midwifery is in your blood, it’s always in your blood,” she said, regarding her decision to come back from semi-retirement to take up the position. While there are no official figures yet, if there is a lockdown baby boom, midwives will have another busy year in 2021.
The hill will be climbed Moto X events organiser Dan Shallcrass sitting atop his machine with the ‘mountain’ peak behind him that each rider this Saturday will be determined to climb. Brightwater’s Mt. Heslington Road will be the centre of serious action this Saturday, 31st October, as motorcyclists struggle to get their machines up a piece of the hill that seems to have the sole purpose of defeating them. A huge event in the US, this is the third year in a row that Dan and the team have put the event together. And it’s not an event to be missed if you need somewhere to take the whole family for a full-day event of excitement, frills and plenty of spills. Junior riders fUll StORy pAge 18 and the clapped-out farmbike riders will join the serious competitors action.
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