Most people who ask me this are worried about the wrong thing first, so let me clear the big one out of the way.
You can use this training anywhere. Any state, any country. Private clients, agency work, hospital programs, community birth work. No state licenses doulas, and DONA International certification is not a US credential, so nothing on this page limits where you can work or who you can serve.
Medicaid is a separate question, and it is not everybody’s goal. Plenty of the doulas I train never bill it and never plan to. But if it is part of your plan, or you think it might be one day, there are a few things worth knowing before you spend money on any training, mine included.
That is what the rest of this page is for. Last checked against each state’s own sources on September 27, 2026.
I built it because doulas write to me every week who paid for a certification, went to enroll with their state, and found out it did not count. Then they paid again.
Pick right the first time. If that turns out not to be me, I would rather you found out now than after.
First, about the cheap ones
Almost nobody who writes to me about this trained with DONA International, or ICEA, or CAPPA. They bought something self-paced and inexpensive that promised certification at the end, and very often promised Medicaid too.
There are a lot of these now, and they tend to look alike. Before you buy any training, ask five questions:
Who teaches it? Not “a labor and delivery nurse” or “a team of public health experts.” Which one. With a name you can look up.
Are there live hours, or is it all self-paced? Both exist. Just know which you are buying.
Who issues the certification? If the answer is the same company that sold you the course, and nobody outside it recognizes that credential, that is worth knowing before you pay rather than after.
Does anyone outside the company accept it? Some of these say outright that they are independent and not compatible with DONA. That is honest of them, and it is also the whole answer to whether your state’s roster will list them.
And the one that actually costs money: will your state Medicaid program take it? These courses almost always claim they qualify you “in multiple states.” Which states? Nobody ever says, and almost nobody ever asks. Ask.
Then check the answer yourself, because even an honest answer goes out of date fast. This area is moving quickly. States are adding benefits, rewriting their rosters and replacing whole credential systems, and a list that was accurate two years ago may not be accurate this morning.
So go and check. That is what this page is for. Find your state below, open the state’s own page in the last column, and see whose certifications are actually named on it. If your state keeps a roster and the program is not on it, no amount of marketing copy changes that.
I am not going to tell you which programs are good and which are not. Somebody has already built a far better tool for that than anything I could write. DoulaMatch’s certification evaluation rubric scores more than 200 certifying organizations out of 27 points across nine criteria: whether you have to do client work, whether anybody evaluates that work, whether there is mentorship, a skills assessment, recertification, a code of ethics, a grievance procedure. Go and score whatever you are considering. Score mine while you are there.
The thing nobody mentions until you are already in it
In a lot of states there is still nothing to bill.
Not because your credential is wrong. Because the state never built the benefit, or built it and never funded it, or handed the whole thing to the insurance companies. Roughly two out of every five doulas I have trained live somewhere like that right now.
So the first question is not whether a training counts. It is whether your state has anything for it to count toward. Find your state below and start there.
How it works almost everywhere
Here is the part that surprises people, and it is true in every state on this page that actually pays doulas.
The state has its own credential or its own registry, and your certification is how you qualify for it. It is not a replacement for it. There is nowhere you finish a training, wave the certificate at Medicaid and start billing. Everybody does the state’s step.
What changes from state to state is whether they also want a few hours of coursework your training did not include. That is the only difference between the next two lists.
Before you read the lists: this page is not the last word
I am going to keep this updated. I am not going to pretend it is gospel.
This whole area is changing faster than any page can keep up with. While I was building this, states added benefits, rewrote their approved rosters, corrected their own published effective dates and replaced entire credential systems. One state’s rules changed twice in the same year.
So every entry here carries the date I last checked it, and that date matters as much as the answer does. Use this page to work out what to ask and where to look. Then open your state’s own page, the one linked beside each entry, and read it for yourself.
If your state’s page says something different from mine, your state is right and I am behind. Tell me and I will fix it.
States where your certification is all the training you need
You still do that state’s own registry or enrollment. You just do not sit through another course.
California. No organization is named. Your training needs to cover at least 16 hours across five topics, and you need three births behind you. Your certificate should itemize the hours and topics; if it does not, you send a syllabus and an attestation instead. Current CPR and a HIPAA attestation are required. You enroll through the PAVE portal, then contract with each managed care plan separately.
New York. Also names no organization. You attest to 24 hours across the state’s competencies and three births. Current adult and infant CPR, familiarity with HIPAA, and liability insurance in your own name. Enrollment runs through eMedNY with an NPI, no fee.
Missouri. Standards-based. A current certificate from a national doula training organization qualifies, as long as the curriculum covers the topics Missouri lists, and there is no extra state course. Six continuing education hours a year. Live since October 1, 2024.
Virginia. DONA International is on Virginia’s approved roster with no partial flag, so the training meets the full 60-hour requirement. Then you apply to the Virginia Certification Board for state certification, which is $100, enroll with DMAS with a background check, and carry liability insurance at $1 million per claim. Fifteen continuing education hours every two years.
Michigan. DONA International is on the MDHHS-approved list, and Michigan asks only for a certificate of completion from a listed organization, not full certification. Apply to the MDHHS Doula Registry, then enroll in CHAMPS with an NPI.
States that want a few more hours on top
Everything above still applies. These states just add some specific coursework, and your training counts toward what they ask for.
Ohio. Ohio takes certification from any recognized doula organization, and the Board of Nursing’s own FAQ names DONA International first on its list of examples. On top of that you attest to four hours on racial bias and health disparities, apply for the State of Ohio Certified Doula certificate through eLicense for $35, enroll with Ohio Medicaid, and contract with each of the seven managed care organizations. Renews every two years with ten contact hours.
Illinois. DONA International is on the pre-approved roster kept by SIU School of Medicine, with one catch: because DONA runs birth and postpartum as separate courses, Illinois wants both. Everyone also documents HIPAA, CPR, cultural competency, trauma-informed care and anatomy, plus three births in the past twelve months. Then the SIU certificate, free, and HFS enrollment.
Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania has its own credential, the Pennsylvania Certification Board’s Certified Perinatal Doula, and it is the only one Medical Assistance enrolls. Your training is how you get it. You document 24 hours of education across their 16 knowledge areas and your workshop hours count toward those 24. One of the 24 has to be HIPAA or client confidentiality, and that is the piece most people need to add. Every certificate you send has to show your name, the training title, the dates, the hours and the organization, or they will not accept it. Then current CPR, three client evaluations from the past year, $50, and a Pennsylvania home or workplace. Then PROMISe enrollment as Provider Type 13, Specialty 130.
One line in Pennsylvania’s paperwork panics people, so let me defuse it. DHS says in writing that a DONA certification cannot be submitted in place of the CPD. True, and it means exactly what Ohio means: the state credential is what they enroll. Your training still counts. It is how you get there.
Maryland. DONA International is on Maryland’s roster, but only as a pair. Maryland wants both the birth and the postpartum certification. Enrollment goes through ePREP with a fingerprint check and liability insurance by attestation. Maryland has new certification rules coming in fall 2026 and a new application process in spring 2027, so check before you apply.
New Jersey. DONA International birth doula certification is on the accepted list. Accepted programs add the Supplemental Community Competency Training, which you have to request by email from the Department of Health; it is not something you can just sign up for. The background check is a New Jersey State Police fingerprint check at no cost to you.
Washington. Washington takes any birth doula training covering its six core topics, which the workshop does. You add training in culturally congruent ancestral practices, apply for Department of Health certification, and enroll in ProviderOne. The $190 fee is waived through June 30, 2027. Renews every two years with ten continuing education hours.
Texas, which is its own thing
Texas has a live benefit, but not the one you are picturing. There is no standalone doula benefit at all. Doulas enroll as case managers under Case Management for Children and Pregnant Women, which pays for case management visits, not for being at the birth. Texas HHSC checks that your certification lines up with nationally recognized standards but names no organization. You start by emailing the state, and they schedule a pre-planning session with you. Every doula bill in the 2025 session died, and the next regular session opens in January 2027.
States where there is nothing to bill yet
If your state is in this section, your credential is not the problem. The benefit is.
Indiana. Indiana authorized doula reimbursement in statute back in 2019 and has never funded or implemented it. No provider type, no credential rule, nothing to apply for. The next thing that might move it is an advisory board report due July 1, 2027.
Kentucky. No state benefit and no doula provider type, so you cannot enroll with Kentucky Medicaid at all. Three of the five managed care plans do cover doula care as a 2026 added benefit, and Humana’s is the real one: five prenatal visits, three postpartum, one for the delivery. Those are contracts with a plan, on that plan’s terms, with no state standard behind them. If you want this work in Kentucky, call the plan directly.
Tennessee. No statewide TennCare benefit. The three managed care organizations run pilots through December 31, 2027, and they contract with organizations rather than enrolling individual doulas. A 2026 bill that named DONA International as the benchmark died in committee.
Florida. No state plan benefit, no doula provider type, and no way to bill fee-for-service. All eight managed care plans now cover doula services as an expanded benefit, which the state announced as universal in May 2026, and each plan sets its own terms. You need a Florida Medicaid ID through limited enrollment as Provider Type 97 and a fingerprint screening, then you go contract with a plan or its vendor.
Wisconsin, North Carolina, Georgia and West Virginia. No benefit, so no credential requirement to meet. Bills have been filed and died in all four, most recently in 2026, and refiles in 2027 are likely. In North Carolina a few managed care plans offer doula support through their own vendors, which again is a contract with that plan rather than a state rule.
Oregon, where this training will not get you there
I would rather tell you this than have you find out afterward.
Oregon Medicaid enrolls only doulas certified through the Oregon Health Authority’s Traditional Health Worker program. That certification takes at least 40 contact hours from an OHA-approved program, and at least 28 of them have to be in person. Oregon says it flatly: “Midwifery education, nursing training, or online childbirth and doula training courses are not accepted as substitutions for in-person doula training.” All ten approved programs are physically in Oregon, and the only reciprocity is with Alaska and Idaho.
My training is live online. It cannot meet those in-person hours. If billing Oregon Medicaid is what you are after, train with an Oregon program.
Two things that might help anyway. One of the approved programs, Doula Love in Portland, runs a workshop that is also DONA-approved, so you would come out with both. And Oregon requires approved programs to give credit for training you have already done, though nobody publishes how much, so ask before you pay for a full retrain.
None of this stops you working as a doula in Oregon with private clients.
Your state is not here?
These are the states where most of my students live. The full library covers all fifty plus the District of Columbia, is checked against each state’s own official source, shows the date each one was last verified, and has a search box. See the state-by-state Medicaid doula requirements library on DoulaBusiness.com.
What the training does, and what it does not
The workshop puts you on the path to DONA International certification. It does not teach Medicaid billing, and no training anywhere can enroll you with your state. Certification comes first, always. The billing and enrollment part happens afterward, and my graduates work through it together in the alumni community while they finish their certification requirements.
Ready to train?
See upcoming birth doula training dates. Three formats, one path to DONA International certification, and a group of graduates who will help you figure out your state.
Questions people ask
Does DONA certification count for Medicaid? In most states that pay doulas, yes, though it helps to understand how. Almost every state has its own credential or registry, and your certification is how you qualify for it rather than a substitute. California, New York, Missouri, Virginia and Michigan want no coursework beyond it. Ohio, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Maryland, New Jersey and Washington want a few more hours on a specific topic. Oregon will not take it. Texas has a benefit that names no credential at all.
Will I have to train twice? The people this happens to are almost never the ones who trained with a recognized organization. They bought a cheap self-paced certification, and their state’s roster had never heard of it. Starting with something your state will actually name is how you avoid the second bill.
Beyond that: where a state adds something, it is a registry application, an attestation, or a short course, not a whole second training. Oregon is the real exception, because of those 28 in-person hours. Pennsylvania and Ohio both enroll their own state credential instead of a national one, which sounds alarming and is not; your hours are how you qualify for theirs.
How do I tell a good certification from a bad one? Not from me. I am selling one, so I am the wrong person to ask. Use DoulaMatch’s certification evaluation rubric, which scores over 200 certifying organizations against the same nine criteria and shows you the working. Score the ones you are weighing up, including mine.
My state has no Medicaid benefit. Is the training still worth it? That is your call and I am not going to make it for you. Something like two in five of the doulas I train are in a state with nothing to bill today, and they train anyway, because private clients, agency work and hospital programs have nothing to do with Medicaid. Several of those states also have bills pending. But if billing Medicaid is the only reason you are looking at this, check your state first.
What if I am not in the United States? Then none of this applies to you. DONA International certification is international, the training runs live online, and I have students well outside the US.
Does the training teach Medicaid billing? No. It leads to certification, which every state wants first. The billing and enrollment work happens after, in the alumni community, where people work through their own state’s process together.
How current is this page? Every entry was checked against that state’s own Medicaid manual, administrative code or official website on September 27, 2026. Rules change. The live library on DoulaBusiness.com carries the date each state was last verified.