The CNSF, to defend and assert the midwifery profession in the perinatal landscape and improve the health of women, children and families. In 2001, the need was felt for an identified interlocutor to participate, with the public authorities and users, in improving perinatal care and women’s reproductive health.
Because midwifery needs to be recognised as a profession, and because its expertise is needed to improve perinatal care and women’s reproductive health, it seemed necessary for midwives to come together, in complete independence, in a learned society that is representative of the diversity of ways in which they practice.
It was against this backdrop that a group of determined midwives set up the CNSF ( Collège National des Sages-Femmes de France) in 2001. The CNSF is the profession’s learned society, bringing together only qualified midwives from all areas of practice : hospital, private practice, local authority and teaching, as well as midwifery students.