Gaining greater insight of Thailand vs Australia midwifery operations

Being given the opportunity to partake in the Global Short Program experience has been one of the best and most eye-opening experiences of my life. My experience with the Global Short Program gave my peers and I the opportunity to visit Thailand and gain insight to how midwifery is practiced overseas as well as develop and understanding of the similarities and differences between the practices and countries. Each country practices medicine differently or has different requirements that must be met in order to become a general practitioner, nurse, midwife, surgeon, and more.

Our amazing hosts in Thailand, Mahidol University and the Faculty of Medicine in Ramathibodi Hospital, gave us an incredibly warm welcome to ensure that we felt comfortable and at home during our stay. The students were incredibly helpful and kind with many of them offering to take us out to visit different restaurants and areas.

My clinical experience there was incredibly eye-opening as we spent several days visiting different historical medical museums, multiple hospital locations each catered for a different community, multiple Mahidol University campuses, as well as different cultural sites. It was amazing to see the difference in quality between newly developed hospitals compared to hospitals that have been in use for decades. The size, quality of equipment, staffing ratios, and method of operations were amazing to witness.

As I learnt more about each hospital such as private and public, I was able to gain greater insight to the differences and comparisons between how midwifery operations work in Thailand vs Australia. For instance, in Thailand, women who labour are separated into rooms depending on which stage of labour they are in so women who are in the first stage of labour will wait in different rooms to women who are in the second stage of labour. I also found it interesting to see that partners and family members were not permitted to visit mothers who were labouring in hospital as in Australia, women are given single rooms to ensure privacy during their labour and birth period with their partner or family member being able to stay with them throughout the entire duration of their labour. Visiting the different Mahidol University campuses was also a great experience as it gave us an insight into the resources available at each campus and allowed us to experience learning as a Thai student would. We were given the opportunity to draw up medication using the method used in Thailand and were also taught how to cannulate using a fake arm and fake blood. I found this amazing as we had not yet learnt this in university ourselves.

Overall, the experience has been amazing and I am forever grateful for the Global Short Programs for giving me the opportunity to be able to experience this. It is one that I will never forget and will continue to encourage future students to partake in as it truly is a once-in-a-lifetime experience for those looking to gain perspective into the international aspect of midwifery.

Jennifer Sackprasit
Faculty of Health
Faculty-Led Program – Mahidol University Midwifery in Thailand
New Colombo Plan Mobility Grant recipient