From: Kathleen Fahy <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Introducing Kathleen Fahy
To: [log in to unmask]
Date: Wednesday, February 3, 2010, 5:09 PM

Kathleen is a professor of midwifery in the School of Nursing and Midwifery. She leads a program of research which involves clinicians and RHD students using both quantitative and qualitative methods.  Her research program is aimed at clinically relevant and significant questions where real change may be needed.  She has taught and written in the area of qualitative methodology over 10 years.  When she conducts qualitative research she brings ideas from postmodern feminism to aid conceptualisation of the problem, data generation and data interpretation.  Kathleen has broad expertise in qualitative methods and theory generation.  Current and recent projects include: cohort study of safety of holistic physiological 3rd stage of labour care, cohort study to identify the relative predictive strengths of risk factors of post partum haemorrhage, critiques of previous research on the safety of birth centre birth versus standard medically-led care; control group experimental studies to enhance breastfeeding to six months postpartum, inter-professional interactions and their impact on health outcomes using interpretive interactionism; optimising women's sense of self during the childbearing year using personal narrative and grounded theorising; group-based antenatal care to promote optimal outcomes for women at increased risk of premature birth using feminist action research; factors affecting midwives clinical decision-making using narrative inquiry.

Kathleen's current work concerns optimising third stage care and the research that underpins practice.

Kathleen Fahy
Professor of Midwifery
School Nursing and Midwifery
Faculty of Health
The University of Newcastle
University Drive,
Callaghan, 2308

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