Contributors

Dr Laura Abbott, FRCM, SFHEA, RGN, RM, BSc (hons), MSc, DHres

Dr Laura Abbott is a Senior Lecturer and Researcher in Midwifery at The University of Hertfordshire, a Senior Fellow of The Higher Education Academy and a Fellow of the Royal College of Midwives. Laura’s doctorate examined the experiences of pregnant women in prison: The Incarcerated Pregnancy: An Ethnographic Study of Perinatal Women in English Prisons. She was awarded the Jean Davies award in 2014 and Midwives award in 2017 from The Iolanthe Midwifery Trust. She has presented at several international conferences and has published several research papers in high quality, international peer reviewed journals. Laura edited the book; Complex Social issues in Maternity Care published by Springer MacMillan in 2021. Laura volunteers with the charity Birth Companions and co‐authored The Birth Charter for pregnant women in England and Wales published by Birth Companions in May 2016. She has been publicly recognised as one of the Nation’s lifesavers from Made at Uni for her research, won the Vice Chancellors Award for Research success in 2020 and has been interviewed about her research by newspaper, radio and TV journalists. Laura has contributed to the review of Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Services operational policy for prison staff managing and caring for all women experiencing pregnancy, Mother and Baby Units (MBUs), and maternal separation in prison. In September 2020 Laura was awarded the Mildred Blaxter Post‐Doctoral Fellowship from The Foundation for the Sociology of Health & Illness to continue with her research into the experiences of imprisoned perinatal women. More recently Laura has co‐founded Pregnancy in Prison Partnership International (PIPPI) with academics in Australia, New Zealand and the USA and the UK wide Prison Midwives Action Group (PMAG).

Cathy Ashwin, PhD, MSc, PGCHE, RM, RN
Honorary Assistant Professor, University of Nottingham, Nottingham, UK

Cathy has worked predominantly in midwifery throughout her career, initially training and becoming a state registered nurse in Lincolnshire working in orthopaedics for a short period, and then undertaking midwifery training. Having worked in all areas specialising in community midwifery and smoking cessation for pregnant women and their families, she moved into midwifery education in 2005. Her key areas of interest are student education, public health and perinatal mental health. She has published and presented at national and international conferences. From 2014 to 2020, she was Editor of and Head of MIDIRS Midwifery Digest, an international midwifery journal and extensive reference database, and is currently a midwifery consultant supporting midwives in developing continuity of care midwifery.

Sam Bassett, DHC, MA, Bsc(Hons), DipHe Mid, RGN, PGSHSCE
Lead Midwife for Education/Head of Department Midwifery, Florence Nightingale Faculty of Nursing, Midwifery & Palliative Care, King's College, London, UK

Sam is an experienced midwife whose ongoing centre of clinical practice is high‐risk pregnancies, having completed her doctorate, focusing on maternal high‐dependency care in 2016. Currently working as lead midwife for education at King’s College London, her areas of teaching expertise include medical complexities in childbirth, maternal high‐dependency care and midwifery emergencies, across both pre‐ and post‐qualification curricula. Clinical midwifery practice remains central to her work, and she is a recognised managing Medical and Obstetric Emergencies and Trauma and Resuscitation Council Newborn Life Support instructor, with a particular interest in the assessment of clinical skills using objective structured clinical examinations.

Jenny Brewster, RM, RN, BSc Health Studies, PGCert Higher Professional Education, MEd
Midwifery Lecturer, University of West London, London, UK

Jenny started her training as a nurse at King's College Hospital in 1978 and worked on a male medical ward before moving to St Peter's Hospital in Chertsey, where she completed her midwifery training. Having worked in the high‐risk environment for several years, she then moved to work in a low‐risk midwifery unit before being appointed as a practice development midwife at Wexham Park Hospital in Slough. This led to meeting the teaching team from the University of West London, where she has now been a midwifery lecturer for 11 years. She has also written for leading midwifery textbooks. One of her main interests is teaching obstetric emergencies, especially the support and resuscitation of the newborn baby.

Carl Clare, RN, Dip N, BSc (Hons), MSc (Lond), PGDE (Lond)
Senior Lecturer, Department of Adult Nursing and Primary Care, School of Health and Social Work, University of Hertfordshire, Hatfield, UK

Carl began his nursing a career in 1990 as a nursing auxiliary. He later undertook 3 years’ student nurse training at Selly Oak Hospital in Birmingham, moving to the Royal Devon and Exeter Hospitals, then to Northwick Park Hospital, and finally to the Royal Brompton & Harefield NHS Trust as a resuscitation officer and honorary teaching fellow of Imperial College London. Since 2006, he has worked at the University of Hertfordshire as a senior lecturer in adult nursing. His key areas of interest are long‐term illness, physiology, sociology, endocrinology and cardiac care.

Emma Dawson‐Goodey, MA, DipHE, RM, RN
Senior Midwifery Lecturer, University of Hertfordshire, Hatfield, UK

Emma began her career in nursing in 1986 and worked on a coronary care unit. Having qualified as a midwife in 1990, she then worked in all areas of midwifery care at Chase Farm Maternity Unit. Since 2003, she has worked in midwifery education and her key interests are low‐risk midwifery care, physical examination of the newborn, family planning, sexual health and global midwifery. Between 2009 and 2019 she worked as a part‐time family planning nurse. Her volunteer work has taken her to Cambodia as part of the RCM Midwifery Global Twinning Campaign, and she continues to undertake volunteer work with the RCM and with midwives in Bangladesh. She was a registrant member of the NMC Fitness to Practise Committee for 8 years.

Kirsty Fishburn, BSc(Hons), MSc, INP, SFHEA
Programme Director for Mental Health, University of Hull, Hull, UK

Kirsty has been a mental health nurse since 2000, spending most of her career in forensic mental health and secure care. She has worked within private mental health service providers in many roles, such as nurse consultant, working up to director of nursing and then further to hospital director and a registered manager role. She completed her independent and supplementary prescribing qualification in 2007 and became an active prescriber, adding to her levels of competence by branching out into developing holistic prescribing practice. She completed her MSc in health professional education in 2011 and commenced her PhD in 2016. She left practice in 2015 to join the University of Hull, where she is the Programme Director for Mental Health and leads the Nurse Non‐Medical Prescribing module.

Debbie Gurney, RN, RM, BSc, MA(Med Ed), FHEA
Senior Lecturer, University of Hertfordshire, Hatfield, UK

Debbie began her career in healthcare by training as an adult nurse at the University of Hertfordshire in 2000. Midwifery training followed and, once qualified, she worked in a rotational midwifery post at the QEII Hospital in Welwyn Garden City. She developed a passion for education and worked within NHS practice development teams while undertaking a Master's degree in medical education, before securing a post as a lecturer. Her key areas of interest include bridging the theory–practice gap, preceptorship, high‐risk maternity care and perineal repair.

Cathy Hamilton, MSc, PGCert
Lead Midwife for Education, University of Hertfordshire, Hatfield, UK

Cathy Hamilton completed her nurse training at St Bartholomew's Hospital, London, in 1984, having undertaken an integrated degree programme at the City University. She later qualified as a midwife at the West Hertfordshire School of Nursing and Midwifery in 1987. She worked in all areas of the maternity unit and as a research assistant before becoming a lecturer at the University of Hertfordshire in 2001. She gained an MSc in midwifery at Southbank University, London, in 2001 and a postgraduate diploma in teaching and learning in higher education in 2003. She completed a doctorate in health research at the University of Hertfordshire in 2018. Since January 2018 she has been the lead midwife for education at the University of Hertfordshire.

Barry Hill, MSc, PGC Academic Practice, BSc(Hons) Intensive Care Nursing, DipHE
Adult Nursing, OA Dip Counselling Skills, RN, NMC RNT/TCH, SFHEA
Programme Leader (Senior Lecturer) in Adult Nursing, Northumbria University, Newcastle, UK

Barry Hill is the Director of Employability for the Department of Nursing, Midwifery and Health at Northumbria University. He is on the editorial board for the British Journal of Nursing and the Healthcare Inform editorial advisory board. He leads and teaches on a range of higher education programmes and modules/courses. Prior to teaching at Northumbria University, he worked in both undergraduate and postgraduate programmes at the University of West London. He was also course leader for PGDIP nursing practice modules for all fields, and pre‐registration adult nursing....