What better way to practice homebirth skills than in a real home. The home of Community Midwifery Matron, Jo Machon, to be exact!

Jo recently hosted the community midwifery homebirth skills and drills training day from her kitchen, conservatory and living room. The day was led by the maternity training and clinical education team, including Specialist Midwives Stevie O'Connell and Rachel Clifford. Thanks to Jo, they were able to run obstetric emergency scenarios for the midwives to play out in a real home setting.

The training also included videos and presentations from our legal team and lots of general discussions, information sharing and team bonding. 

Line managers, Jo and even Jo's mum, Joyce, were on hand to prepare the midwives their lunches - homemade tomato soup and sausage rolls! Joyce even brought out some sweet treats for the team afterwards.

Where possible Maternity Voices Partnership Chair Amy Lidell, Director of Midwifery and Women’s Services Gemma Puckett and Deputy Head of Midwifery Laura Douglas join the team for the sessions. They've even had a mum and her baby join to share her homebirth experience.

The feedback from this training has been overwhelmingly positive.

Deputy Chief Nurse, Jo Middleton, said: "Jo is an absolute ray of sunshine! To be so creative, supportive and innovative to her approach to training is great to see and so solution focused to the issues we have around training venues is just fantastic. I'm sure the teams really appreciate her doing this, and to hear that her mum even contributes is fabulous."