The Effect of the Student Midwife Support Circle (SMSC) Intervention on Burnout, Resilience, and Professional Belongingness Levels of Midwifery Students: A Mixed-Method Study

While midwifery is a field that provides a high level of job satisfaction, the health and well-being of midwives can be emotionally strained and significantly affected by negative workplace stressors. Prominent stressors include exposure to traumatic events and organizational factors such as unsupportive and functionally inadequate work environments.

Clinical practice in midwifery is a fundamental component of midwifery education, and student midwives are exposed to similar occupational stressors as professional midwives during this process. These stressors include witnessing traumatic events during childbirth, observing disrespectful treatment, coercion, and abuse of mothers, and exposure to violence and bullying. Such experiences can negatively impact the health and well-being of midwifery students and contribute to the development of secondary traumatic stress, burnout, and compassion fatigue. Furthermore, mismatches between expectations and clinical experiences, exposure to traumatic clinical experiences, and accompanying emotional distress can increase the risk of early departure from midwifery programs.

Midwife students face many factors such as the adjustment process to the university environment, heavy academic workload, and economic stress. Another increasingly prominent source of stress today is the decrease in opportunities for professional support and connection with midwifery colleagues in clinical practice. This situation can negatively affect the development of a sense of belonging, which is closely related to student participation, professional identity development, and the support of emotional health and well-being.

In recent years, there has been a growing interest in identifying interventions to support the emotional health and well-being of midwife students. While there is extensive literature on interventions developed for qualified midwives and nurses, research addressing interventions specific to student midwives is limited. Current studies show that intervention components such as mindfulness, psychological resilience, mentoring, and clinical supervision, as well as reflective group practices, provide positive psychological effects.

Evaluation of some intervention components, such as stress management and mindfulness, revealed specific and significant benefits for student midwives, despite the limited sample size.