The Perinatal Health Worker Training (PHWT) prepares individuals to serve within their community in various capacities, including direct perinatal care and support, advocacy and policy engagement, and entry-level social work and public health careers.
Through comprehensive and structured training paired with practical skills experience, PHWT seeks to increase the number of highly skilled and culturally congruent Black womxn employed in the public health and human service profession.
Click here to see our Scope of Practice chart.
How is Mamatoto’s training different from others?
Unlike other birth worker training programs, participants gain a comprehensive understanding of reproductive justice, community, and perinatal health, while being trained by experienced maternal health professionals. Additionally, those seeking to gain birth experience will have the opportunity to attend births with experienced PCHWs.
We are NOT training you to be doulas, but rather providing you with transferable skills that can be applied to other career pathways in maternal and child health, human services, and public health.
What does training cover?
Our core PHWT training is 161-classroom hours which include role-plays, hands-on skill development, learning activities, lectures, and videos and covers skills and academic knowledge related to (this is not an exhaustive list):
- Public Health 101
- Maternal Health and Reproductive Justice
- Nutrition for Pregnancy and Breastfeeding
- Birth Justice
- Complications in the Perinatal Period
- Newborn Care and Development
- Perinatal Mental Health
- The Postpartum Period
- Basic Lactation Management
- Teaching Adult Learners
- Contraception Counseling and Fertility Awareness
Trainee Opportunities
We want to help you achieve your full potential so you, in turn, can help other people achieve theirs. Trainees in the DC Metro area who complete the training can apply for employment at Mamatoto Village or have support in finding a local placement.
Add-On Modules (also available as stand-alone modules without attending the training)
For those interested in providing labor support and/or obtaining advanced lactation skills, the following modules are available;
- Expanded Birth (40-hour training)
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- Communication with the provider
- Birth planning
- Anatomy and physiology of pregnancy and birth;
- Comfort measures and labor techniques
- Pelvic balancing and rebozo skills
- Complications and interventions in the perinatal period
- Techniques for resolution of a complicated birth
- Postpartum
- Lactation Specialist (45-hour)
