How to Become a Doula?

How to become a doula,

Doulas mean a woman who serves. Registered doulas with a particular interest in newborns may consider doulas as a career option. These doulas help with the care of newborns brought prematurely or measured at danger. Still, their responsibilities could even include care for infants who experience long-term difficulties related to early birth or illness after birth.

While doulas get training and are educated about labor and pregnancy, they are not medical specialists and do not offer any medical advice.

The prime role of doulas at the time of childbirth is to provide the physical help and responsive support necessary to foster a safe and comforting environment for the mother in labor.

The doula’s role is to focus her care and provide support to the laboring mother, which she does by providing information, assisting the expectant mother in developing her birthing plan, and providing physical and emotional support throughout the labor and potentially after childbirth as well.

What Do Doulas Do?

Doulas are of 3 types – all performing varying duties and are beneficial at different times in the pre and post pregnancy cycle.

  • Birth Doula – Provides emotional, informational, and physical support to the laboring mother.
  • Postpartum Doula – They offer support in the initial weeks ensuing the delivery of the baby. They deliver info and support in regards to caring for the baby. Also, they can assist with cleaning, running, and cooking small errands for the new parents.
  • Antepartum Doula – delivers maintenance and care to the mother who has been put on bed rest or is suffering a higher risk of pregnancy.

Doula certification

While this field may be satisfying, there are few of the character traits, instructive needs and certifications a potential doula must be mindful of before chasing a career in doula nursing. Doula certification is obtainable from childbirth education administrations and doula training programs like Birth Arts International and DONA International.

Though it’s not always needed, accreditation is essential as it will show open doors to a wider variety of job opportunities and impart confidence in your customers. In specific, if you are looking for work with a hospital or birth center, you will have to hold suitable professional identifications. The profession path to a non-certified doula is much more flexible and lets you train at your own pace.

1. Doula certification programs

Many organizations offer training programs for potential doulas. Doulas who wish to finally become certified by an organization such as CAPPA or DONA International or Worldwide must look out a training program that is accepted by one of such organizations.

It could take many weeks or months; however, to encounter every education needs to begin working with mothers and more time after that to meet the experience necessities necessary to become certified. The certification programs are related to

  • Learn About Birth Doula Training
  • Learn About Postpartum Doula Training
  • Find A Doula Workshop

Once verified, birth doulas earn the credential CD (DONA), and postpartum doulas receive PCD (DONA).

2. Doula training

To become a certified birth doula, one has to finish the needs of the certification granting program. These needs include reading training literature, writing essays attending multiple births, attending training classes, and workshops. Dona International provides the most important and best-known certification program.

They accepted workshops deliver a minimum of 15 hours of teaching time, with importance on practical hands-on methods, benefits of doula support, the history of birth as well as the significance of doula support for families.

3. Doula Salary

A doula’s salary differs importantly dependent on geographic location, how much knowledge, understanding, and training you have, and how many hours of work you do per week. Charging a flat fee is most common, and it’s also recommended because the length of the birth can vary considerably.

Though, salary for birth doulas usually runs between $250 and $1000. The annual salary is $107,460. Actual salaries may fluctuate greatly depending on the specialization within the location, field, and years of experience, along with a variety of other factors.

How long does it take to become a doula?

Typically, a birth doula needs to finish 7 to 12 hours of childbirth teaching, 16 hours of birth doula training, and attend at two to five births. A postpartum doula usually attends about 27 hours of postpartum doula education and helps at least two women with the support of postpartum.

There are even a few of the distance learning programs that are available. Some of the more popular organization that has doula training includes DONA, ALACE, CAPPA, CBI, AND ICEA. To fulfill the requirements, you will have to go through the below process:

  • Attending a Breastfeeding class take
  • Attending an Introduction to Childbirth class takes
  • Attending a DONA approved birth doula workshop
  • Viewing an online seminar
  • Writing an essay on birth doulas
  • Obtaining written references from healthcare professionals

What are the long term career prospects for doulas?

As doula gets the right amount of experience and shapes a base of fulfilled customers, doulas must be able to invite more clients and perhaps charge a higher rate for their services. Few of the doulas supplement their business by providing teaching to mothers and by training new doulas.

Doulas support and guide pregnant women and new mothers from the procedure of childbirth and the post-delivery period. Doulas do not give any medical care or advice, but they help enable communication between mothers and medical professionals. The job of a doula can be physically demanding, as they care for women throughout their labors, which can last numerous hours.