Keeping up to date with CPD as a Midwife

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If you’re a nurse, midwife or healthcare professional (or thinking about it), you will know that once you get that qualification the learning does not stop there. Yes, you can specialise and get postgraduate qualifications, but there’s a basic level you have to keep up. Every three years you need to re-validate as a Nurse and Midwife. Part of that is a training and education upkeep – you need to show that you’ve done 35 hours of CPD (continuous professional development) relevant to your practice in a three year period since your last revalidation or since you qualified. 20 must be participatory learning, i.e training with a group and a trainer rather than self-supported.

What counts for your CPD

The 20 participatory hours are usually pretty easy to fill, your employer should provide mandatory annual training, and you only need roughly a 7 hour training day each year to fulfil that. Most health professionals will fill about 30 hours from their employer provided training.

So, where can we find those other hours? Well you can do your own studying either online or by reflecting on your own study. If you subscribe to magazines like the Nursing Times, they often have articles that will tell you if you read and reflect on them how much time goes towards your CPD. You can also do your own research or complete reflective accounts.

I like to be proactive in my learning, I think it’s important to realise when you have gaps in your knowledge and look at filling them yourself. I recently took some extra training online at The Health Professional Academy entitled Safe sleep positions in pregnancy CPD module. The free CPD courses by Mum and Baby Academy are my favourite online resources for Midwives, nurses, GPs, Health Visitors and pharmacists, they have lots of CPD accredited training to choose from and you get a certificate you can print out at the end of it. I’ve used it quite a bit already, even though I don’t have to re-validate for another two years. When I do it will be easy. Here’s how it works:

Firstly, you create a free account on their website. You don’t get any mail from them or spam, so it’s worth signing up. Once you’re registered, bookmark the page so you can come back to it when you need to. Then it’s just a matter of choosing which module you’d like to take. They are all CPD accredited so you can choose what interests you or what you will benefit from. Have a look around and see if there’s an area you’d like to deepen your knowledge of. The breastfeeding one is next on my list.

Obviously for Midwives, choose the Mum and Baby section, there you will find relevant modules. This time, I chose ‘Sleep Positions in Pregnancy,’ because although I advise to go to sleep on the left side, I don’t know what to suggest when they wake up in the night on their backs. I say not to worry, but is that correct?

Once you start the module, you get learning objectives so that you will know what you will gain from the module and you can see if it’s for you.

You also fill out a pre and post learning reflection to check that the module has impacted your practice.

It’s very easy to work through, clear and simple and not too long. At the end, there is a short assessment to complete, then you get a score and a unique completion code. You can choose to download the clinical review and the assessment. Your certificate will be emailed to you and you can download and print it for your portfolio.

You might be wondering how they receive any benefit from giving out free training. Each module has a sponsor, so when you complete it you will be shown an advertorial related to the module. The sleep positions in pregnancy module was sponsored by a pregnancy pillow brand and there was a slide showing their pillows. I found the ad non intrusive, and there was no click button, just some information on it.

Conclusion

If you’re looking for some easy yet in depth CPD modules to take to underpin your Midwifery knowledge and practice or you just need some extra CPD for your portfolio and re-validation, the Health Professional Academy is for you. Have you tried it yet?

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