University integration of midwifery training

Hello Priscille, you're the director of midwifery training, and also vice-dean for midwifery studies at Sorbonne University's Faculty of Health Sciences. What does this mean to you?

It seems to me that this change of name, from a Faculty of Medicine to a Faculty of Health Sciences, is a strong message of openness towards all the health training programs integrated into Sorbonne Université, both medical, like ours, and paramedical. This is a turning point that several French universities have recently taken, and I can only applaud it.

We're also fortunate to have been integrated into the dean's team, for my part as you mentioned, but also for two of our students, Héloïs Hermann who is student vice-dean of the Faculty of Health Sciences and Mélodie Tran-Thuan who is student vice-president of Sorbonne Université. It's a sign of confidence on the part of the Dean and their fellow students in other fields, which honours us.

I hope that, in practical terms, this will encourage admission to our program in the years to come, with high school students applying to the Faculty of Health Sciences. And that it will also encourage greater inter-professional collaboration, thanks to research and teaching collaborations similar to those already underway in the care departments.

Midwifery studies will be integrated into the Faculty of Health Sciences on January 1^st, 2025. What are the consequences for teachers and students?

The teaching team is made up of nine midwifery teachers and two teacher-researchers. The former will be seconded to Sorbonne Université by the AP-HP as of January 1. The complementarity of our profiles is invaluable in ensuring that tomorrow's midwives benefit from the various facets of high-level clinical, theoretical and research training, as well as assessments in line with current university requirements (OSCE and clinical assessment in simulation and at the patient's bedside, in addition to theoretical tests). We are supported in our tasks by an administrative manager and two pedagogical secretaries.

Students now only register at the University and no longer at the AP-HP, but in reality their state diploma (with a master's degree) was already issued by Sorbonne Université. As of January 1, no more courses will be held on the AP-HP Picpus campus, but the overall organization of teaching and internships, not only in the GH departments but throughout the Île-de-France region, remains unchanged.

You'll be moving into new premises on the Pitié-Salpêtrière site. What will be the main changes?

We will have offices for the entire teaching and administrative team on the Pitié-Salpêtrière site, as well as a dedicated practical training room. We'll be in a very promising environment, close to the Faculty of Health Sciences, where our fellow doctors are trained, as well as to the simulation platform and clinical services. We have a network of teachers from outside the department who “follow” us at La Pitié, and others with whom we are building closer ties.

What's the next step in this evolution?

From the start of the 2024 academic year, maieutics students will follow a 6-year university course, following the addition of a short third cycle (a sixth year, like the odontology and pharmacy courses). This will lead to the award of a doctorate in maieutics once the thesis has been defended. We are currently in the process of applying this reform to our 2nd year students and preparing its implementation for subsequent years.

We would also like to be able to create a reception and living space for our students, close to our offices, to regain a “school” spirit and closeness between us all, which we somewhat lost when we moved from Saint-Antoine to the Picpus Campus in 2020.

Finally, we are continuing to develop research in maieutics and midwifery, in conjunction with the clinical teams of the DMU ORIGYN and the research teams of iPLESP and the new Institut de soins primaires et ambulatoires Sorbonne Université.  In this context, we also collaborate more widely with research teams from other universities, notably Paris-Cité.