Nadia Bardien

Nadia has a special interest in fetal surveillance and is a RANZCOG clinical educator.

Biography

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Nadia is a registered nurse and midwife and the Nursing Unit Manager of the Department of Perinatal Medicine at the Mercy Hospital for Women. She is an experienced and skilled clinician, having worked across the full breadth of midwifery services, from low risk birthing centres to tertiary hospital settings in South Africa and Australia. She has over 15 years of experience in fetal surveillance and the care of women with high risk pregnancies.

She is an active researcher and holds a Masters degree from La Trobe University. Her research interests include late onset growth restriction and fetal Doppler measurements. Her 2016 research publication in PLoS ONE showed that term babies born at appropriate birth weight but with reduced growth in late pregnancy have ultrasound and clinical evidence of placental insufficiency. These "appropriately-grown" babies with placental insufficiency may represent an under-recognised group at increased risk of term stillbirth.

Nadia is also a passionate and skilled educator. She is employed by the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists as a clinical educator for the RANZCOG Fetal Surveillance Education Program (hyperlink to http://www.fsep.edu.au) and travels regularly around Australia and New Zealand to deliver face-to-face teaching to obstetricians and midwives.  Together with Professor Sue Walker, she developed a unique education package for midwives to attain competency in ultrasound assessment of fetal presentation, amniotic fluid index and umbilical artery Doppler measurement. This has allowed our midwife-led Fetal Surveillance Unit to expand to meet the growing needs of pregnant women with high risk pregnancies.

Nadia also represents the midwifery profession at the The Victorian Maternity and Newborn Clinical Network, where she sits on the maternity eHandbook subcommittee. 

Nadia's leadership as a clinician, researcher and educator has been central to improving the standard of maternity care and advancing a culture of multidisciplinary collaboration within Mercy Perinatal and beyond.