Shay-Lee Spargo has been named New To Practice Midwife of the Year at the region's 2024 Nursing and Midwifery Awards.
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The Lachlan Health Service midwife says she couldn't help but fall in love with her work, which sees her journey with mums through pregnancy, birth and into motherhood.
"Midwifery is a forever growing career with countless pathways and so much joy," she said.
"There are particular parts of the job that I have connected with including continuity of care, being a part of what's mostly the happiest time in people's lives, having the opportunity to become an autonomous health care practitioner especially being in a rural setting out here in western NSW, being able to work with women in terms of education and assisting them to make empowered informed decisions around their care and journey, as well as just continuously learning every day."
Lachlan Health Service Midwifery Unit Manager Nicole White said Shay thoroughly deserved the recognition.
"She is compassionate, caring, hard-working and above all passionate about providing outstanding care for mothers and babies in our community," Mrs White said.
"We are incredibly proud to have Shay as part of our team, and I'm really excited to see how far she can go in her career."
Shay-Lee started her career as a core midwifery staff member at Forbes hospital last year, and recently joined the midwifery group practice in Parkes.
In this role, Shay-Lee is on call for the women in her care 24 hours a day when she is rostered on.
She works with expecting mums, has the honour of sharing labour and birth with women and their support people, then follows up with those postnatal checks - usually at home - offering breastfeeding support, emotional support and education
"Midwives with MGP get to work in a small group setting with each midwife having a caseload of women who they are the primary care provider of," Shay-Lee explained.
"We focus on women's individual needs and being woman centred at all times empowering and educating women to make informed evidence based decisions for their care.
"We have a large scope of practice including comprehensive care for pregnancy, birth and postpartum, administration of medications, cannulation, collaboration with other health care professionals such as obstetricians.
"We review ultrasound and pathology tests, are trained in obstetric emergencies, offer breastfeeding support and education, and support parents who experience loss and birth trauma and so much more."
The award nomination came as a very pleasant surprise.
"I do love my job and am extremely passionate about midwifery and providing woman-centred care, but at the end of the day the reason I am still here and thriving through all the highs and lows that this job has to offer is because of the other beautiful midwives I get to work alongside," she said.
"It takes great midwives to make great midwives and for me to have won an award like this is honestly a reflection of the nurturing and support I have received from my colleagues who are so amazing at what they do. So big shoutout to Lachlan maternity midwives!"
Western NSW Local Health District announced this year's award recipients at a presentation dinner with colleagues and guests.
Adrian Fahy, WNSWLHD Executive Director Quality, Clinical Safety and Nursing, said he was delighted to have the opportunity to congratulate each award recipient.
"All eight recipients of this year's Nursing and Midwifery Awards were truly deserving and I was thrilled to present them with their awards, as well as acknowledge all the nominees and those who received honourable mentions in each category," Mr Fahy said.
"As always we were faced with the difficult task of selecting recipients in each category having received some wonderful nominations this year, but that's a great problem to have.
"The recipients from our local award categories will now be put forward as nominees for the 2024 NSW Health Excellence in Nursing and Midwifery Awards."
