Introduction:

Reports from the past times mostly note that almost all deliveries were attended by women and that this art was taught from woman to woman. Their role has existed since the very beginning of civilization, based on the relationship of trust and complicity they are capable of establishing with the woman and the family during childbirth care.

Objective:

To distinguish the importance of the obstetric nurse role for the provision of childbirth care.

Methods:

A systematic bibliographic review was carried out to develop a reflexive-critical analysis of the content of documents. We considered doctoral dissertations and master's degree theses, as well as original and review articles published between 2005 and 2015 in both Spanish and English. The search was made in the databases SciELO and Academic Google, from January to March 2016. The key words used were: historia [history], comadronas [midwives], enfermera obstétrica [obstetric nurses], and funciones [functions]. After the identification of the pre-selected studies, the titles, summary and key words were read, verifying the pertinence with the study.

Conclusion:

The review throughout the history and evolution of obstetric nursing allowed recognizing the value of midwives in the provision of care as well as their influence on the evolution of this specialty with the appearance of nursing.

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