Do You Need a Doula UK Approved Course?

Kicki Hansard

Jul 2

13 min read

Updated: Sep 8

Kicki Hansard doula standing by a lake in Swedish Lapland.

If you are researching how to become a doula in the UK, you will probably come across the phrase Doula UK Approved Course. You may also notice that The BirthBliss Doula Academy is no longer listed as one of Doula UK's Approved Course Providers.

Understandably, people ask why, particularly when approval by Doula UK has been presented for many years as an important route into the profession. My answer is not especially simple because my relationship with Doula UK goes back almost as far as my life as a doula.

I was one of its founding members and gave many years of voluntary work to an organisation I genuinely believed in.

Leaving was not a quick decision prompted by one disagreement. It came after a long period in which my confidence in the organisation's leadership, culture and public direction gradually changed.

There are two separate questions here. The first is whether you need to complete a Doula UK Approved Course to work as a doula. You do not. The second is why I decided that The BirthBliss Doula Academy could no longer remain part of the Approved Course Provider scheme. That answer is more personal and it deserves to be given with care.

The quick read

You do not need to complete a Doula UK Approved Course or become a Doula UK member to work as a doula in the UK. Doula UK is a membership organisation, not a statutory regulator. If you train elsewhere and later decide that membership matters to you, its Alternative Pathway may still provide a route into membership, subject to its current eligibility requirements.
I was a founding member of Doula UK and supported the organisation for many years. I left after gradually losing confidence in its governance, culture and public direction. Four Approved Course Providers have left during the past twelve months and many doulas now work independently of Doula UK, although I do not presume that other providers or doulas share my reasons.
My deepest concern was that remaining a member and Approved Course Provider could make it appear that Doula UK represented my understanding of doula work. I do not believe a doula exists to reinforce professional advice or make women more compliant. A doula supports the woman to hear information, ask questions and make her own decisions while respecting clear professional boundaries.
My position is about the present directors and leadership team, not the idea of Doula UK itself. I would consider becoming a member again if the current leadership were replaced and an independent, genuinely member-led process rebuilt confidence, transparency and accountability within the organisation.

Doula UK approval is not a legal requirement

Doula UK is a membership organisation and Community Interest Company. It is not a statutory regulator of doulas or doula education. There is no law requiring someone to complete a Doula UK Approved Course, become a Doula UK member or seek permission from any one organisation before working as a doula in the UK.

An approved course has been assessed against criteria set by Doula UK and offers a direct route into its membership and mentoring structure. That may matter to someone who already knows that she wants to become a Doula UK member. It does not mean that courses outside the scheme are automatically less thorough or that doulas trained elsewhere are less professional.

The doula world is much wider than it was when Doula UK began. Four Approved Course Providers have left during the past twelve months. Each will have made that decision for its own reasons, so I would not presume to speak for them. The movement does show that leaving the scheme is no longer an isolated or unusual choice. Many doulas also work independently of Doula UK or belong to other communities and professional networks. They carry appropriate insurance, continue learning, maintain clear boundaries and build trusted practices through the quality of their work.

Membership can bring community, mentoring and shared standards. Those things can be valuable, particularly in the early years of practice. Membership is not the same as competence and an approval badge cannot tell you everything you need to know about an educator or a course. The quality of a doula's work rests in her training, judgement, integrity, self-awareness and the way she supports each family.

You can still seek Doula UK membership after training elsewhere

Choosing a course that is not approved by Doula UK does not necessarily close the door to membership later. Doula UK offers an Alternative Pathway for birth professionals, experienced doulas and people who have completed comprehensive doula training elsewhere.

At the time of writing, the pathway consists of two online modules and costs £200. Doula UK says that once the modules have been completed, participants can find a Doula UK mentor and join. Its requirements, dates and fees may change, so anyone considering this route should check the current information directly with Doula UK.

This matters because prospective students are sometimes left with the impression that choosing a non-approved course means they can never become members. That is not what Doula UK's own information says. You can choose the training that feels right for you, gain experience and consider membership later if it remains important to you.

Why my relationship with Doula UK mattered so much

I trained as a birth doula in 2002, when the word doula was still unfamiliar to most people in the UK. There were few courses and little understanding of how continuous emotional, physical and informational support could sit alongside maternity care. Those of us drawn to the work felt that we were building something important together.

I became a founding member of Doula UK because I believed doulas needed a place to belong. I wanted an organisation that would uphold good practice, support doulas when the work became difficult and help the maternity system understand what doulas actually do. Over the years I served as website administrator, Head of External Communications and Chair. I helped organise the first Doula UK conference, represented the organisation externally and worked alongside many people who gave their time with generosity and conviction.

I remain grateful for much of that experience. Many friendships were formed through Doula UK and many families have benefited from the work of its members. Nothing about my decision to leave takes that history away or diminishes the doulas, mentors and volunteers who continue to care deeply about their work.

That history was one reason leaving took so long. When we have helped to build something, we tend to hold on to the hope that difficult periods will pass and that concerns can be resolved from within. Remaining an Approved Course Provider also made commercial sense. Prospective students recognised the logo and some treated it as reassurance that they were choosing a good course. I knew that leaving might make my own work harder and that people who did not understand the wider context might question the standard of BirthBliss training.

Professional integrity sometimes asks something different from commercial convenience.

I reached a point where I could no longer recommend an organisation simply because retaining its approval benefited my business.

When membership begins to look like agreement

The question that finally became impossible to avoid was whether Doula UK still represented my understanding of the doula role and the values I teach.

An organisation describing itself publicly as a leading voice for doulas can easily be understood by families, maternity professionals and policymakers as speaking for the profession as a whole. Those of us who remain inside it may then appear to endorse its statements and direction, even where there is serious disagreement beneath the surface.

I became increasingly uncomfortable with being represented in that way. My continued membership and Approved Course Provider status risked saying something I no longer believed.

Silence can look like consent and I did not want my silence to suggest that Doula UK spoke for me, for BirthBliss or for the doulas I had trained.

My understanding of doula work is clear. A doula supports the woman and her family. She does not make clinical decisions, interpret medical findings or advise a woman to accept or refuse care. She does not replace a midwife and she should never stand between a woman and urgent clinical information. Her presence can create enough calm for information to be heard, questions to be asked and decisions to be made without the woman losing her place at the centre of her own care.

A doula's role is not to secure a particular outcome. It is also not to make a woman more compliant with professional advice. Respectful collaboration with midwives and doctors matters enormously, although collaboration does not require a doula to transfer her loyalty from the woman to the clinical system.

The response I wanted to hear

Earlier in 2026, the death of a baby following a home birth led to a Prevention of Future Deaths report and distressing coverage of the doula's role. The death of a baby must never be reduced to an argument about professional identity. The child and her family deserve humanity and careful attention to everything that happened.

The coroner found that the presence and work of the doula had negatively affected the effective provision of midwifery services. That is a serious finding and it should not be dismissed. The published report also recorded that the doula had not actively discouraged the midwives from accessing the mother, that members of the midwifery team perceived her as a buffer and that she was following the birth plan and supporting the parents in accordance with it.

Doula UK responded by saying that it would review and strengthen its policies, guidance and continuing professional development. Reflection after a serious incident is necessary. I also wanted the organisation that is widely seen as representing doulas to explain the legitimate role of a doula with equal clarity. I wanted it to say that doulas do not provide clinical advice or obstruct care and that supporting a woman to understand information and make her own decisions is not, in itself, unsafe behaviour.

The word buffer stayed with me. When a woman accepts a recommendation, her decision may pass without difficulty. When she pauses, asks questions or declines, the person supporting her can begin to be seen as an obstacle even where that person has neither spoken for her nor prevented care. Clinical expertise and a woman's autonomy must be able to exist in the same room. A representative organisation for doulas should be capable of holding both truths.

I have written separately and in greater depth about the report, its wording and the questions it raises about advice, consent and independent support in When Advice Is Given and Women's Choice Remains.

The relationship with the Nursing and Midwifery Council

I have always encouraged respectful relationships between doulas, midwives, obstetricians and the wider maternity team. Women and families are better served when each person understands the role and boundaries of the others. My concern was not that Doula UK communicated with the Nursing and Midwifery Council. It was the way the doula role appeared to be positioned within that relationship.

In a publicly available video produced with the Nursing and Midwifery Council, a Doula UK representative agreed with a description of the doula's role as being to psychologically reinforce what the midwife is saying. I found that wording deeply uncomfortable because it does not reflect the philosophy I have taught throughout my career.

A doula may help a woman hear and understand what a midwife is saying. She may encourage respectful communication and help reduce tension in the room. Psychological reinforcement suggests something more. It suggests that the doula's task includes helping professional advice to land in a way that moves the woman towards agreement. Once that expectation is placed upon the role, independent support begins to change.

The Nursing and Midwifery Council has faced significant public scrutiny following independent reviews of its culture and regulatory work. That made it particularly important, in my view, for a doula organisation to retain a clearly independent understanding of whom the doula serves.

What happened when I raised concerns

The concerns that led me to leave did not appear all at once. They developed over time as I asked questions about governance, transparency, accountability and the direction in which the organisation was moving. I raised matters privately because I hoped they could be discussed and resolved within the organisation.

Healthy member-led organisations should be able to hear difficult questions without treating scrutiny as disloyalty. They should explain how decisions have been made, acknowledge when something has gone wrong and allow respectful disagreement to exist. Challenge often comes from people who care deeply about the organisation and want it to live up to its purpose.

My experience gradually left me without confidence that questions and concerns from members were being received in that spirit. Ordinary scrutiny could be experienced as an attack and disagreement could become something to manage rather than an opportunity for reflection. I found myself spending more energy trying to have the conversation than seeing any meaningful willingness to engage with what lay beneath it.

Racism, discrimination and bullying are serious and must be examined properly whenever concerns arise. They require fair processes, careful listening and a willingness to look honestly at behaviour and impact. Serious language should not bring unrelated governance questions to an end. A healthy organisation should be capable of examining the conduct of the person asking a question while still answering the substance of the question itself.

The values I teach within BirthBliss include curiosity, openness, compassion, accountability and reflective practice. We ask doulas to consider what went well, what felt difficult and what they might approach differently next time. I came to believe that I could not remain attached to an organisation whose present leadership appeared unwilling to offer its members the same openness.

My responsibility to the doulas I train

The most difficult part was not deciding whether I should remain a member. It was deciding whether I could continue encouraging BirthBliss graduates to join.

People come to doula training from many different lives. Some are changing careers and others are returning to work after raising children. Many are investing savings because they believe this is work they are meant to do. They place significant trust in their course provider, not only to teach them about birth and postnatal support but to introduce them responsibly to the profession they are entering.

When an educator recommends a book, an additional course or a professional organisation, that recommendation carries weight. It is an endorsement. For many years I was comfortable making that endorsement of Doula UK. Eventually I was not.

Remaining an Approved Course Provider would have protected a familiar route for my students and made the Academy easier to market. It would also have asked me to continue lending my name to a leadership and direction I no longer supported. I could not do that honestly.

My decision does not remove choice from BirthBliss graduates. They may work independently, join another network or explore Doula UK's Alternative Pathway if they later decide that membership is right for them. My responsibility is to give them accurate information and support their ability to make that decision for themselves.

What I would need to see before returning

I have not rejected the idea of Doula UK or the value of a national organisation for doulas. I helped to establish it because I believed the profession needed representation, community and a shared commitment to good practice. I still believe those things matter.

My position concerns the present leadership and the culture that has developed around it. I would consider becoming a member again if the current directors and leadership team were replaced and a genuinely independent, member-led process rebuilt confidence in the organisation.

For me, that would require directors chosen through a clear and trusted process, meaningful transparency about decision-making and finances, open recruitment for paid opportunities and a culture in which members can ask difficult questions without being treated as a problem. It would also require a complaints process that protects families while treating doulas fairly and leadership willing to represent the proper independence of the doula role.

This is not about wanting the organisation to fail. It is about believing that an organisation with influence over the profession should be accountable to the members in whose name it speaks. Doula UK could still become an organisation I would be proud to support. I do not believe that change can happen under the present leadership.

How to choose a doula course

If you are comparing doula courses, start with the educators. Look at their experience as doulas as well as trainers, how long they have supported families and whether they remain willing to reflect on their own practice. Experience matters and so does humility.

Look closely at the philosophy beneath the course. Every training programme carries assumptions about birth, authority, professional relationships and what a doula should become. Consider whether the woman remains at the centre, whether informed choice is respected and whether students are encouraged to think carefully rather than reproduce one approved way of working.

Professional boundaries should be taught clearly. A responsible course will explain that doulas are not medical professionals and do not diagnose, prescribe, interpret clinical information or make decisions for families. It should also teach students how to collaborate respectfully without losing sight of the person they are there to support.

Ask what happens after the course. Training is the beginning of professional development, not its conclusion. Find out whether graduates have access to community, mentoring or coaching, continued learning and practical help while they establish their work.

Most of all, notice whether questions are welcome. Becoming a doula asks us to sit with complexity, uncertainty and experiences that may not fit neatly into one answer. The right learning environment should make room for curiosity and honest conversation.

Where BirthBliss stands today

The BirthBliss Doula Academy is no longer a Doula UK Approved Course. That was a deliberate decision reached after long reflection and with an understanding of the professional and commercial consequences.

What has not changed is our commitment to thorough, human-centred birth and postnatal doula education grounded in the values we have held since the Academy began in 2012. Our course covers antenatal, birth and postnatal support, communication, professional boundaries, loss and the practical realities of self-employment. Students are given space to discover their own way of being a doula rather than become a copy of somebody else.

We continue to support graduates through our community, optional certification with a Doula Coach and six months' membership of The Doula Directory. We do not claim to be the only good doula course in the UK. We teach with integrity, speak honestly about the realities of doula work and take seriously the trust that every student places in us.

You may decide that Doula UK membership matters to you. You may prefer a different organisation or choose to work independently. Each is a legitimate decision when it is made thoughtfully and with clear information.

I helped to build Doula UK because I believed doulas deserved representation. I left because I no longer believed its present leadership represented me. Speaking openly about that is not an attempt to tell other doulas what they should think. It is a refusal to let my continued silence be mistaken for agreement.

Doula UK does not speak for every doula and under its present leadership, it does not speak for me.

If you are exploring becoming a doula, you can read my Complete Guide to Becoming a Doula in the UK.