Occupational well-being in community and hospital midwives in the Netherlands: A cross-sectional study

Midwives in the Netherlands face sustainability challenges, with 40 % leaving the profession within 15 years after graduation. Dissatisfaction with maternity care organisation, on-call demands, and work-life balance are reasons to leave, and one third of midwives intended to leave the job.

This study explores the well-being of midwives in both community and hospital settings and identifies contributing factors.

A cross-sectional survey was conducted among 995 practicing midwives using an online questionnaire.

Nearly 40 % of Dutch midwives reported high work engagement. Compared to hospital midwives, community midwives reported equal levels of work engagement, higher levels of work- and personal-related burnout, and significantly lower levels of client-related burnout. Hope and work-life balance were identified as significant factors in both mitigating burnout symptoms and enhancing work engagement among community and hospital midwives. Determinants contributing to work engagement and burnout were largely similar between community and hospital midwives and included hope, passion for midwifery, high work variety and balancing work with private life.

Dutch midwives reported relatively low levels of burnout and high work engagement compared to international data. Midwives' well-being while working in a community or a hospital setting differed slightly but not significantly. Community midwives showed significantly lower client-related burnout than hospital midwives, although higher levels of work- and personal-related burnout. The findings underscore the importance of supporting midwives in balancing their professional and personal lives in different phases of their career, particularly through flexible working conditions, fostering hope, and working with passion according to their ideologies.