Sage-Femme Midwifery is an independent midwifery practice offering homebirth/hospital midwifery care, monitrice, well woman and basic primary care for women!
Sage-Femme Midwifery is an affiliation of women's health professionals who provide compassionate, holistic women's care throughout the life cycle.
In addition to full-scope independent midwifery, Sage-Femme provides space for nurturing mothers, babies, and families and hopes to be a proverbial village for healthfully birthing and raising children. Sage-Femme midwifery offers: breastfeeding, childbirth, and parenting classes, a new mother's support group, chiropractic & massage days, referral and coordination of care with a multidisciplinary team of birth professionals, and meeting space for workshops/informationals/gatherings of interest and benefit to families.
Unique to the Midwifery community, Sage-Femme offers both homebirth care and hospital-based midwifery. In the home setting, a team of three birth professionals will attend each family providing guidance and support throughout the birth process and beyond. Our admitting privileges at the Burdett Care Center in Troy NY and Bellevue Women's Center in Niskayuna NY, ensure that, should a planned homebirth require transfer to a hospital setting, Sage-Femme Midwifery is able to provide continuity of care in that setting thereby avoiding a transfer to a different maternity practice. Families planning a hospital birth with Sage-Femme enjoy the same personalized midwifery model of care which includes follow up care in the home setting upon discharge.
Complimentary consultations to explore the option of midwifery in the home or hospital setting provided.
Located just two miles east of SUNY-Albany and minutes from I-90, this convenient location provides ample on-street parking and is located at the corner of Washington Avenue and Winthrop Avenue.
Meet Us:
Kelly McDermott, Director of Midwifery, LM, CPM, CNM, MS
Kelly, Founder and Director of Sage-Femme Midwifery, was called to midwifery as a ministry and vocation by the birth of her first child at home in 1984. Like many midwives, her relationship with birth has been long and varied. She has been privileged to serve as a direct-entry midwife, a Certified Professional Midwife, a labor and delivery nurse, and as a Masters prepared Certified Nurse Midwife. All 6 of her children were born at home. Her return to homebirth is a celebration and a rekindling of her commitment to women and birth.
Kathie Breault, CNM, LM
Kathie Breault is the owner of Safe Passage Midwifery and a Certified Nurse Midwife. Her personal and professional experience is that women birth better in the comfort, peace, and safety of their own homes. Kathie has been working with pregnant and birthing women in the Capital Region since 1987; first, as an RN at Albany Medical Center Hospital’s Labor and Delivery Unit, and later as a midwife, her calling. Kathie had her third baby at home in 1983, and graduated from SUNY Downstate’s Midwifery program in 1993. She worked in several area hospitals before “coming home.” Kathie has been attending births at home with Safe Passage Midwifery since 2009, except for a year in which she helped to establish Birthvillage, the first Birthing Center in Kerala, India.
Kristen Klein, CNM, LM
Kristen Klein is the owner of Sage Femme Midwifery North. She is a Certified Professional Midwife. She is also a DONA trained Doula (2005). Shortly after receiving a massage certificate at The Polarity Realization Institute, she learned about doula care and was inspired to serve women in this way. She did not actively pursue certification until after the birth of her first son in 2002. That experience was so empowering and transformative that she felt supporting other women on this journey was truly her calling in life. She has previously offered her services as a doula and birth assistant. In her free time she enjoys the outdoors and spending time with her potter husband and their three children.
Briana Ranes, RN, Birth Assistant & Infant Feeding Specialist
Owner of “Birthing With Love”, and a Registered Nurse since 2004, Briana Ranes has worked in a variety of clinical areas but spent most of her time working in the Emergency Department. She has been in awe of birth since first witnessing it, as a child, on her family’s farm. Like many, her path to midwifery began through the births of her children. These experiences led her to know the true care and compassion of midwifery. Always feeling it was her calling to serve and care for others, Briana feels privileged and humbled to serve the families of several independent midwifery practices, including Sage-femme Midwifery. Briana lives on a small farm near Cobleskill and loves spending time outdoors making memories with her husband and four children.
Hannah Gregory, Midwifery Student
Hannah, owner of Hannah Grace Birth Services, is a midwifery student who felt called to work with women and children through midwifery several years ago when she spent some time at a hospital in Togo, West Africa. She grew up in a family of 9 and has always loved, and been surrounded by, birth, babies, and women. Most recently, Hannah spent six months in Hawaii taking a course designed for training midwives for the developing world. She continues her studies in an online midwifery program. Through her course work and apprenticeship training, Hannah intends to pursue the Certified Professional Midwifery credential. In addition, she offers placenta encapsulation services for Sage Femme Midwifery families. She feels honored to work with the Sage Femme Midwifery team and serve their community of families.
Suzi Goldman, Administrative Consultant
Suzi Goldman, owner of Suzi’s Solutions, feels privileged to share her administrative talents with Sage-femme Midwifery. She has 10 years of corporate experience at local and national levels, including Marketing, Business Development, Sales, Training and Operations. Suzi currently supports several developing and existing practices bringing creativity and vision to her role. She is a former La Leche League Leader and breastfeeding mom of two whose personal experiences help to foster other mothers’ trust in themselves and the natural birth process. In addition to her administrative consulting work, Suzi owns Suzi’s Celebrations, an event planning business, and organizes celebrations for all occasions.
Sarah Mraz, Postpartum and Infant Care Doula & Infant Feeding Specialist
Sarah Mraz, owner of Essentially Sarah, provides physical and emotional support in the postpartum period. She also teaches breastfeeding classes to the Sage Femme Midwifery ladies. She believes that new mothers need support and she enjoys providing that support. Her family took in foster care infants throughout her teenage years. This gave her experience and a love of taking care of babies. She has one child of her own and has 20 years of experience in public education. She currently offers postpartum doula care and teaches Breastfeeding Basics to the Sage Femme Midwifery families.
Sarah Read, ICEA Certified Childbirth Educator
Sarah Read has been interested in educating and empowering families in preparation for childbirth since her first pregnancy, during which she became fascinated by the strength and knowledge of the birthing body. With a background in special education, she decided to pursue certification as a Childbirth Educator and has enjoyed combining her love for teaching with her belief that every mama has the right to information and support as tools towards a safe, empowering, and satisfying birth experience. Having had an incredible homebirth with Sage-Femme, she is excited to add There’s No Place Like Home childbirth preparation classes to her teaching schedule.