This panel is hosted by ACM Midwifery Advisor Tani Paxton and features Panelists Dr Teresa Lewis, Dr Lorna Davies and Dr Roslyn Donnellan-Fernandez

Panelists
Tani Paxton
Tani published alongside Dr Carolyn Hastie and Dr Roslyn Donnellan-Fernandez in Midwifery in 2023. This research demonstrated midwives as key actors in climate activism. This research was inspired by observing midwives working with birthing women in Bali and homebirth in Australia. It can be accessed here: An exploratory study of women and midwives’ perceptions of environmental waste management – homebirth as climate action - ScienceDirect

Dr Teresa Lewis
Following in the footsteps of her great grandmother and grandmother Teresa was conferred with a Grad. Dip. Midwifery 23 years ago. Seeing that there was a gap in supporting young teenage mothers to stay in education she, along with a colleague set up the first teenage pregnancy/education support program on the Sunshine Coast, Queensland. Church support allowed the program to flourish whereby interested parties in Ed Queensland expanded it and implemented the program at one of the local schools where it is still in operation.

Interested in the environment and health, fifteen years ago Teresa was one of the first midwives in Australia be conferred with a Master’s degree in Environmental Change Management. Post PhD allowed her to participate in the inaugural Global Green and Healthy Hospitals Connect innovative online platform (Washington) as a panel expert in leadership aiding hospitals globally to mitigate their GHG emissions.

As an independent consultant and an academic she has been invited to many discussions on sustainability and mitigation in Australia. As an academic, her research interests include the symbiotic-like relationship between humans and their environment. During the Anthropocene era, she would welcome a development in an environmental sustainability standard to improve safety and care in adverse weather events for midwives and researching the impact of extreme temperatures during pregnancy.

Dr Lorna Davies
Lorna Davies is a midwife of 30 plus years who has worked in midwifery education for over 25 years on both undergraduate and postgraduate programmes in both the UK and New Zealand. She was most recently employed as an Associate Professor in Midwifery at Otago Polytechnic but is now enjoying semi-retirement at her home in the mountains of North Canterbury in Aotearoa New Zealand where she works as a midwifery consultant and freelance educator. Lorna’s main research focus is how sustainability as a broad concept is reflected within the midwifery profession. Her PhD was an analysis of how midwives in Aotearoa view sustainability and she has published her findings in journals, podcasts, webinars and textbooks. She co-edited the book ‘Sustainability, Midwifery and Birth’ in 2011 followed by an updated second edition in 2020. She also presented an impact of climate change proposal to ICM which was adopted by the ICM Board in Prague in 2014 and reviewed in 2021. Lorna is firmly of the belief that the midwifery model of care is aligned with the philosophical foundations of sustainability and will continue to flag up the importance of sustainability literacy in the profession.

Dr Roslyn Donnellan-Fernandez