JENNIE JOSEPH

JENNIE JOSEPH WALKS INTO THE EXAM ROOM IN HER WINTER Garden, Fla., birth center and unleashes a crinkly-eyed smile at her patient, who is 34 weeks pregnant, and her patient’s 4-year-old daughter. In a typical health care setting, an appointment like this one—with a healthy pregnant woman with no complications—would last just a few minutes. A quick exam and she’d be shown the door.

But that, says Joseph, is not the way she works. Instead, she seems to melt into the interaction, slowly reviewing test results, bantering about iron intake, and inviting the child to help measure her mother’s belly. “You need to feel safe, you need to feel whole, you need to feel supported,” Joseph, a certified professional midwife (CPM), says. “People