The Midwife Center is thrilled to announce our 11th Ruth Brexendorf Stifel Fellow, Nia Graziano, CNM, MSN!
Some of you may have met Nia while she was at TMC as a midwifery student or during her time with us as a nurse. She will begin her fellowship in January and will be available for both gynecological visits as well as prenatal care, labor, and birth care.
Nia received her undergraduate nursing degree from West Virginia University in 2008. Following graduation, she worked seven years as a Pediatric Intensive Care Nurse in both staff and travel positions from Pittsburgh to Arizona. After returning to Pittsburgh, she discovered TMC and the midwifery model of care while pregnant with her first son. It was then she knew she had found her true passion in caring for women and families. She received her master’s in nursing and midwifery from Frontier Nursing University in 2016.
The Midwife Center has played an important role in Nia’s life, both professionally and personally. She is honored to begin serving the women in her community as TMC’s newest Ruth Brexendorf Stifel fellow. She is committed to using the beauty and art of midwifery to hold sacred the space that women allow her to enter to be present and part of such monumental moments in their lives.
About the Ruth Brexenxdorf Stifel Fellowship
Named after our founding Medical Director’s (Dr. Elizabeth Stifel) mother-in-law, in 2010 The Midwife Center designed the fellowship for new midwife graduates to have up to a one-year placement that includes an extended orientation and educational and leadership opportunities. Once the fellow is oriented, they will work as a full member of our provider staff so that we can take care of more clients in the practice.
The Fellowship also helps The Midwife Center address the national shortage of midwives with birth center experience and therefore have more of an impact on maternal and infant health outcomes in our region and beyond. It also addresses TMC’s long-term goals of providing educational opportunities for midwives to strengthen the midwifery profession and birth center model of care, which are being recognized locally and nationally as providing high quality, low cost care.
Contributions to the Ruth Brexendorf Stifel Fellowship help keep The Midwife Center’s unique services accessible to more individuals and families in our region, and contributes to the future of birth centers in the United States. Support the fellowship with a donation.