Mary Cronk MBE (1934 – 21 December 2018) was an independent midwife from Scotland who was awarded her MBE for services to midwifery over her many years of practice.

Early life

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Cronk was born in Glasgow in 1932, the daughter of a Clydeside ship worker.[1] She first studied nursing at Glasgow Royal Infirmary, and in 1957 started training to be a midwife at Queen Charlotte's in London.

Career

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Cronk worked for the National Health Service in the UK where she facilitated more than 1600 births, mainly as home births.[2] In 1991, she opened her own practice and started working as an independent midwife.

Cronk joined the English National Board of the United Kingdom Central Council for Nursing, Midwifery and Health Visiting, and served on the RCM Council between September 1999 and August 2003.

Cronk also wrote many articles on midwifery, covering a variety of topics, including physiological breech birth, of which she was a proponent.[3] These have been published in Midwifery Matters and AIMS Journal,[4] as well as quoted in various books.[5][6]

Once retired, Cronk continued to educate by hosting study days alongside fellow independent midwife Jane Evans; the pair disseminated information on unusual but normal births, including breech birth.[7]

Obituary

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Cronk died on 21 December 2018, aged 86. [8]

Selected publications

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  • "The Midwife: A Professional Servant?". 2000. in Mavis Kirkham (15 September 2010). The Midwife-Mother Relationship. Palgrave Macmillan. pp. 50–. ISBN 978-1-137-13276-5. Chapter 4.[9][10]
  • "Community midwifery: a practical guide". with Caroline Flint 1989[11][12]
  • Radical Midwifery: Celebrating 21 Years of A.R.M. 1997. Margaret Jowitt, Ishbel Kargar, with contributions by Cronk[2]
  • "Keep Your Hands off the Breech". AIMS Journal, Vol 10 No 3. 1998.

References

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  1. ^ "Mary Cronk: A Professional Servant. | AIMS".
  2. ^ a b Siobhan Scanlan; Hilary Walker (1 November 2013). Studying for Your Midwifery Degree. SAGE Publications. pp. 136–. ISBN 978-1-4462-9632-5.
  3. ^ Rosemary Mander (21 May 2007). Caesarean: Just Another Way of Birth?. Routledge. pp. 94–. ISBN 978-1-134-14480-8.
  4. ^ "Keep Your Hands off the Breech | AIMS".
  5. ^ Denis Walsh; Soo Downe (7 May 2013). Essential Midwifery Practice: Intrapartum Care. John Wiley & Sons. pp. 2–. ISBN 978-1-118-70001-3.
  6. ^ Vicky Chapman; Cathy Charles (22 January 2013). The Midwife's Labour and Birth Handbook. John Wiley & Sons. pp. 291–. ISBN 978-1-118-48010-6.
  7. ^ Jennifer Block (1 September 2007). Pushed: The Painful Truth about Childbirth and Modern Maternity Care. Da Capo Press, Incorporated. pp. 76–. ISBN 978-0-7382-1182-4.
  8. ^ "Mary Cronk: A Professional Servant. | AIMS".
  9. ^ Rosemary Mander; Jo Murphy-Lawless (12 April 2013). The Politics of Maternity. Routledge. pp. 145–. ISBN 978-1-136-73700-8.
  10. ^ Lesley Ann Page; Rona McCandlish (6 October 2006). The New Midwifery: Science and Sensitivity in Practice. Elsevier Health Sciences UK. pp. 104–. ISBN 978-0-7020-3506-7.
  11. ^ Elinor Clarke (24 July 2015). Law and Ethics for Midwifery. Routledge. pp. 19–. ISBN 978-1-317-42896-1.
  12. ^ Tony Butterworth; Jean Faugier (14 December 2013). Clinical Supervision and Mentorship in Nursing. Springer. pp. 107–. ISBN 978-1-4899-7228-6.
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