Teaching to Get Nurses an Midwives Empowering Women: Nursing Students’ Perceptions on Professional´s Roles during Perinatal Care

Abstract

Female empowerment is a key concept in the current healthcare environment, especially in perinatal care. The educational process offered by universities to train future nurses and midwives has a great influence on their professional attitude and performance. To be able to educate in a way that encourages empowerment, it is essential for higher education institutions to know the starting point relating to students’ opinions on the subject. It was conducted a cross-sectional descriptive observational study, at the University of Huelva. It used a self-developed, semi-structured questionnaire, previously validated, to gather quantitative and qualitative data. A total of 117 nursing student were surveyed. Participants consider that general nurses supplement the work of the midwife and acts as a facilitator for the process of women’s empowerment in the perinatal period. They believe that the midwife is the professional figure of reference and the one in which they place greater trust. Improvement proposals for both types of professionals are based on improving training and resources. To encourage the development of the profession and improve the quality of care, it is essential to introduce features related to women’s empowerment in the undergraduate training of future nurses and midwives.