About Us

Melinda Hoskins, MS, RN, CNM, IBCLC

Melinda is the owner and founder of A Nurturing Space.   She brings more than
thirty years of experience in maternal and child nursing, including newborn intensive
care, labor and delivery and working in the office of her family physician husband,
David Hoskins.  In addition, she has taught pediatric and maternity nursing at
nursing programs in Oregon, California and Nevada.

The Hoskins have three grown daughters, who have helped to mold our philosophy
and programs at A Nurturing Space.

In 1999 Melinda first became an Internationally Board Certified Lactation
Consultant, or IBCLC.  The decision to become certified as a lactation consultant
grew out of her longstanding interest in breastfeeding and support of mothers in
establishing this most important aspect of the mother-baby relationship.  All three of
the Hoskins' daughters were breastfed for an extended period of time.  Melinda's
interest in breastfeeding preceded the birth of her first daughter and is reflected in her
master's thesis (completed in 1979) which looked at telephone support of first-time
breastfeeding mothers!


In 2004 Melinda fulfilled her long-term dream of becoming a Certified
Nurse-Midwife or CNM, when she completed the Community-based
Nurse-midwifery Education Program, or CNEP, through Frontier School of
Midwifery and Family Nursing and passed the certification exam.  One of the
strengths of the CNEP program is the educational emphasis on the development of
free-standing birth centers as the ideal place for the practice of midwifery.

In the fall of 2004 through August 2005, Melinda participated in a fellowship in
birth center midwifery at the Women's Health and Birth Center in Santa Rosa,
California.  This allowed her to have first hand exposure to the art of midwifery in a  
well-established birth center. During this time she attended the births of about 60
babies.  The midwives at the WHBC have hospital privileges at Sutter Medical
Center Santa Rosa, and have some patients who chose to birth at the hospital.  At
times it is necessary for a birth center patient to be transferred to the hospital for
additional services, beyond the scope of the birth center's practice.  The CNM's are
involved in their continued care at the hospital.  Learn more about WHBC at their
website:  WHBC


Unable to arrange a collaborative relationship with a local obstetrician since
completing the birth center fellowship, Melinda has accepted a position as Assistant
Professor in the Orvis School of Nursing at University of Nevada Reno.  While she is
teaching full-time at Orvis, she will also be building a practice in Minden at A
Nurturing Space.