Hello,
As Jane suggested in her recent posting, I'm writing to introduce myself to the
list. My name is Jeanne Raisler, I'm a midwifery teacher at the University of
Michigan, and the chair of the Division of Research for the American College of
Nurse-Midwives. My past research has mostly focused on breastfeeding and
midwifery care.

I have a current funded research project comparing midwifery and physician care
of low risk, low income urban women during labor and birth. I'm using 5 years
of data from a local hospital's perinatal database to study the association
between the caregiving and procedures (like induction/stimulation of labor,
epidural anesthesia, etc) used by the midwives and MDs and outcomes like
cesarean section, vacuum or forceps delivery, episiotomy and lacerations.

I'm also involved in midwifery research, clinical care and training about
HIV/AIDS, in the US and especially in severely affected countries. Midwives are
the front line caregivers in this pandemic, and there is tremendous potential
for us to also be educators and researchers in this area. Together with
colleagues at University of Michigan and the Muhumbili College of Health
Sciences (including Dr. Helen Lugina, Acting Dean of the MUCHS College of
Nursing and a member of the RSC of ICM), I'm working on a research proposal
about the impact of HIV/AIDS on breastfeeding counseling and care in Dar es
Salaam, Tanzania.
I'd be interested in corresponding with other midwives who are involved in
research about HIV/AIDS, especially pMTCT and breastfeeding issues.

Jeanne Raisler