GAB-Awards-winning midwife honoured for FGM work

A pioneering midwife who cares for victims of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), and has campaigned tirelessly to eradicate the practice in the UK for more than 25 years, has received a national honour for her services.

2011 GAB Awards recipient, Dr Comfort Momoh MBE - FGM and public health specialist at Guy’s and St Thomas’, was awarded a Fellowship by the Royal College of Midwives (RCM) at their annual lecture in Leeds. She is the first FGM specialist to be awarded a Fellowship by the RCM.

Comfort established one of the UK’s first FGM clinics at Guy’s Hospital in 1997.

She says: “It is an honour to be awarded one of the first ever Fellowships by the Royal College of Midwifery. Collaboration and empowerment is the key to changing and saving lives. With the support of organisations like the RCM, together, one day, we will see an end to FGM.”

The RCM Fellow category of membership recognises individuals who provide exceptional leadership and deliver innovation and excellence in midwifery practice, education or research. 

The aim of the Fellowship is so that midwives can apply and showcase the high quality work they do in improving care for women, babies and their families.  The RCM is encouraging members to apply for a Fellowship which brings enhanced membership benefits to Fellows.

Lynne Pacanowski, Director of Midwifery at Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust, says: “I am delighted that Comfort has been honoured by the RCM with one of the first Fellowships. Since establishing the clinic at Guy’s Hospital almost 20 years ago, she has built up a nationally recognised service and trained many midwives and doctors in the management of FGM. Most importantly, she has earned the trust of, and emboldened hundreds of women and girls to work towards a future where FGM is eradicated.”

Comfort acted as an expert witness for the All Party Parliamentary Group hearings on FGM for England and Wales in 2000 and 2014 and for Scotland in 2005. She has also represented the World Health Organisation on issues around FGM.  Comfort provides training and speaks at conferences at local, national and international levels.  In April 2013, she was invited by the Australian Health Minister to give a presentation at their summit on FGM in Canberra. 

Comfort is also a visiting lecturer at a number of prominent institutions including King’s College London, the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, and Middlesex University. She received an MBE in 2008 in recognition of her services for women’s health and holds a honorary doctorate from Middlesex University. 

Professor Lesley Page, President of the Royal College of Midwives, says: “Comfort’s work around FGM has made a huge contribution in bringing this terrible practice to public attention. It has directly contributed to the great strides we have made towards stopping this crime, here in the UK, and internationally. Her work, her dedication and her determination to this cause are formidable and I am delighted that her work has been recognised in this way.”