The CASA Midwifery School

After preparing their public health presentations – including hand-sewn model pelvises, breasts and amniotic sacs – the students from CASA midwifery school boarded a run-down bus, ate American cheese and hot pepper sandwiches, and rode 32 hours from their school in San Miguel de Allende to the small city of José Maria Morelos in the Southern state of Quintana Roo. 

The students came to CASA from diverse backgrounds. Ema, a former performance artist, and her wife were the first couple to be married under Mexico City's marriage equality law. Angie was a seventeen year old fresh out of high school in a small ranch town. Practicing nurse Abi was interested in homeopathy, spiritual midwifery, and home birth. Elisa was about to graduate and saw midwifery as a daunting but useful career. 

When they arrived in José Maria Morelos, all 38 students slept on the floor of a classroom at the Universidad Intercultural Maya, an institution designed to allow local Maya students access to higher education without leaving their communities. There, the university''s public health students joined local Mayan midwives in listening to CASA student presentations about neonatal resuscitation, post-partum hemorrhage and prenatal care. 

The traditional midwives, who had learned from relatives and practiced for many years, taught the students about home births, herbal medicines, and their own approaches to obstetric emergencies and prenatal care. They emphasized the use of massage to ensure proper fetal positioning and to control post-partum bleeding, delivery in hammocks, and positions conducive to labor and delivery.

CASA's students travel to rural communities to study with traditional midwives twice a year. The goal of this knowledge exchange is to equip students with practical training and an understanding of the role of traditional midwives, and to preserve the knowledge and practices of indigenous healthcare providers.