Jhpiego

Building the next generation of nursing and midwifery leaders.

Nurses and midwives are the cornerstone of the health system. They are skilled providers of primary, emergency and specialized care, and are often the first contact people have with the formal health care system. Yet, there is a worldwide shortage of these critical frontline health workers, especially in Southeast Asia and Africa. To help meet global health targets and ensure the health of communities, Jhpiego works with ministries of health and other partners to strengthen nursing and midwifery leadership and elevate the professional associations that represent these essential health workers.

OUR APPROACHES

Build nursing and midwifery leadership skills

Nurses and midwives have the hands-on experience, practical skills, passion and knowledge needed to bring real change to the formal health care system. Through our gender-transformative leadership toolkit and our nursing leadership toolkit, we provide countries with practical tools to build the next generation of nurse and midwifery leaders. We have worked in more than 15 countries to build the capacity of nursing and midwifery professional associations or councils to advance their profession.

Apply innovative solutions to achieve universal health coverage

Our approaches enable nurses and midwives to assume expanded roles in health care delivery and provide technology-enabled access to continued professional development anytime, anywhere. We’ve strengthened pre-service education systems in more delivery models of care to reduce the burden on health workers, such as family-led post-natal care in Ethiopia, family-led tuberculosis care in India, group-based antenatal care in multiple countries, and self-care for contraception.

Drive change through policy and advocacy

Through our engagement in global dialogues to advance midwifery models of care, along with partners such as the World Health Organization, International Confederation of Midwives, and United Nations Population Fund, we are committed at the global level to advancing both professions. At the national level, we support professional associations to use policy dialogues to advocate for change and guide ministries in converting policies into practice.

Program Experts

Julia Bluestone

Certified Nurse Midwife, Technical Director, Learning and Performance

Countries

Club Courage Offers Mutual Support for Midwives in Mali

With prompts and evidence-based advice, Club Courage offers midwives a safe space to discuss and resolve professional and personal issues.

To meet global targets for health and well-being, an additional 10 million nurses and midwives are needed by 2030.

— The World Health Organization

Empowering nurses worldwide with evidence-based leadership principles and practical tools for transforming healthcare delivery.

Our mission is to strengthen nursing leadership capacity globally by providing accessible, evidence-based training materials that empower nurses to lead transformational change in healthcare systems and improve patient outcomes worldwide.

Access the toolkit.

The Midwifery Accelerator is a unified, evidence-driven global initiative aimed at significantly improving maternal and newborn health outcomes by scaling up midwifery models of care globally. It's a coalition of UN health agencies (UNFPA, WHO, UNICEF), the International Confederation of Midwives (ICM), Jhpiego, governments, funders, civil society, academia, private sector and other key stakeholders working together to integrate high-quality midwifery services into national health systems.

Read the report.