Health
This or that midwife? For Gabriel Backer it doesn’t matter
Gabriel Backer, student of midwifery science at the Hanover Medical School. In front of him lies a Pinard tube for listening to fetal heart sounds. photo
© Michael Matthey/dpa
In Germany, a male midwife is the big exception to the rule. A midwifery student talks about his experiences accompanying births. And about whether he sees himself as exotic.
Gabriel Backer doesn’t really care whether he’s called the midwife or the midwife. For him it is clear: “I am a midwife.” The 22-year-old is studying midwifery at the Hannover Medical School (MHH) – he is the only man among the 90 enrolled students.
It is also an absolute exception nationwide. In Germany, “there are currently only 23 males working in clinics “Midwives counted” – with a total of around 25,000 midwives, says Michaela Peeters from the German Midwives Association.
Gabriel Backer grew up in a large family in North Rhine-Westphalia. He has two older siblings and a younger sibling as well as many cousins. “That means there were always children somewhere,” he says.
The idea of studying midwifery became concrete a year ago when Backer realized that he did not want to continue his teaching studies at the University of Bonn. “Much too dry for me,” he says. It was always clear to him that he wanted to work with people, either in the social or medical field. Backer had a point of contact with the profession with the mother of a friend, who works as a midwife. He exchanged ideas with her and also found an internship through her.
First birth: “Definitely very impressive”
Backer initially got to know the work during three internships. “The very first birth I ever saw was a caesarean section,” says the 22-year-old. “That was definitely very impressive to see.”
After the internships, Backer applied to study midwifery and his first semester in Hanover began in October 2023. Since then, he has been learning everything about birth by alternating between theory in the lecture hall and practice in everyday hospital life. What excites him most about the job is the fascination of birth, as he says. “That sounds a bit romanticized, but it’s just the honor of being able to accompany people in this important phase and support them.”
Does it matter in everyday professional life that he is a man?
According to the chairwoman of the Lower Saxony Midwives Association, Hilke Schauland, a midwife must above all be empathetic and good at communicating with those giving birth. “The art of midwifery is to know everything theoretically,” she explains. A midwife has to be prepared for everything in order to be able to react appropriately in every situation during the birth.
According to Schauland, the fact that male midwives cannot have children themselves is irrelevant. After all, “there are also female midwives who don’t have children,” she says. Still, “it’s a woman’s job, still.” There are currently no male midwives among the 2,350 members of the Lower Saxony Midwives Association.
The job title is definitely the same for all genders
So far, his gender has not played a major role in the delivery room, says Backer. Very few women would have had a problem with him being a male student. The 22-year-old says that many expectant mothers say: “I also have a gynecologist.”
In 2020, the federal midwifery law came into force and midwifery training was converted into an academic course of study. At the university, it has now become normal for him, as a man, to study midwifery, says Backer. Many fellow students were happy “that there are now men who do this too.”
Backer believes that it is quite possible that more men will work as midwives in the future – simply because of academicization. So it was the same with him. If it had been “an apprenticeship, I don’t think I would have really thought of it.”
In any case, there are good opportunities for the future: There is also a great need for skilled workers in midwifery.