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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

in thinking a 'check up scan' shouldnt be done in the same area as women having miscarriages, ectopics etc?

102 replies

misdee · 02/12/2010 17:46

i had to have a scan today to check position of baby#5. apart from this, i have had an uncomplicated pregnancy.

However, I was very aware of through the doors is the ward for women whose pregnancies arent going so well. They are also scanned in the same area :(

My previous scans inc dating and anaolomy scans have been done in a different maternity unit. Obviously there will be cases down there when news isnt good for some. but to scan someone with no major issues in the same area as women losing their babies seem insensitive and wrong.

why is this happening?

really felt for the women going past me with my bump :(

OP posts:
libelulle · 02/12/2010 18:24

It is dreadful. It should take such a small amount of imagination and empathy to arrange things so that that kind of thing doesn't happen, and yet so often it does.

Agree with Riven too - when DS was born at 26 weeks this summer I discharged myself the same day as they were threatening to put me in the postnatal ward with all the lovely big healthy fullterm babies. Still had to have mypostnatal checks there and they made me wait in the breastfeeding room for a midwife to be free. At least the midwife had the grace to apologise when she came in to find me collapsed on the floor howling uncontrollably.

ClaireDeLoon · 02/12/2010 18:25

Tante it isn't just infertility appointments. We recently had to go back to hospital to get the result of genetic testing they had done on the embryo (done because of recurrent mc) and that was in maternity. I felt like asking why this wasn't arranged for a gynae clinic but the day was upsetting enough already without getting into an argument and prolonging it further.

theevildead2 · 02/12/2010 18:26

Same at my local hospital. Had to go in to get my ovaries scanned for cycts to confimr I was probably infertile :( I loved sitting next to the happy excited pregnant women!

I cried to my doc and she said they don't like it either but the hospital won't change things.
I'm pregnant now and feel guilty going in for "nice" scans.

Simbacatlives · 02/12/2010 18:31

I had a retained placenta sent for emergency scan. I had my 5 day old baby with me. It was a turn up and sati in was about 20th- everyone else was being scanned for bleeding/miscarriage.

I didn't know- walked into the room- one woman shrieked and burst into tears. I spent 2 hours sitting on the floor in a cold dirty corridor with my baby.

RJRabbit · 02/12/2010 18:32

I was asked to have a scan for teaching purposes about half an hour before having my right tube removed along with an ectopic pregnancy.

I had to walk through a room full of smiling prospective mums and dads. I couldn't have cared less, being more interested in my own crap situation.

lottiejenkins · 02/12/2010 18:38

When i lost my oldest son in Dec 1994 i was put back into a room on my own, but it was in the middle of a maternity ward so even with the door closed i could hear all the babies crying outside!! Was beyond awful!! Sad

LoopyLoops · 02/12/2010 18:38

I recently went to see the consultant obs to discuss implications of another pregnancy after the stillbirth of DTD1. Not only was the whole meeting a disastrous waste of time, it took place in the room where I sat after hearing the news of the stillbirth. I was so traumatised about being in the same room, I couldn't remember what questions I wanted to ask. (My PTSD involves flashbacks to that room).
They really don't think.

Original poster
misdee · 02/12/2010 18:47

yes Going, QE2. just through the double door from where i was sitting was a lady i know having a suspected ectopic :(

now i have the all-clear i am considering home-birth again. as really dont want to go back there (long long story)

OP posts:
pink4ever · 02/12/2010 18:49

Loopyloops-I was put in the same room numerous times when I had my mmcs. Made me really freak out(room was a post op one I think so could hear babies being born by section). Is horrible hearing a newborn cry when you know your baby never going to Sad

Porcelain · 02/12/2010 18:49

That's horrible loopy.
I have a friend whose baby died mid pregnancy. They took her into a delivery room to tell her

AnyFuckerForAMincePie · 02/12/2010 18:55

when I had my second mc (after years of fertility treatment) I was put in a ward next to women who had had terminations

no words to describe how that felt

onceamai · 02/12/2010 18:56

Is that QE2 in Margate? If so I went there because of suspected miscarriage when visiting my mother. The maternity/gynae care then was insensitive and incompetent. It was disgraceful then but no worse than when my dd was admitted with a broken leg many years later. Never come across ruder NHS staff in my entire life.

onceamai · 02/12/2010 18:57

And in the context of this thread - yes the insensitivity towards women who have miscarried or suffered a still birth is disgusting. Comments such as "did you want it" - still ring in my ears.

nancydrewrockinaroundxmastree · 02/12/2010 18:58

takingchances my DS was stillborn at St. Thomas's and the thing that I found really unbearable was that they had "thoughtfully" scheduled a scan (we knew he was going to die) during their problem pregnancy clinic so not only did I sit and wait in the waiting room for over an hour but I was surrounded by woman with huge bumps who were clearly off their face on crack/alcohol and kept nipping out for fags.

That was just too much

duchesse · 02/12/2010 18:59

Our local hospital is brilliant compared to some others then! When I had several scares during early pregnancy that eventually turned into a MMC, I was put for observation onto a ward full of older ladies in for hysterectomies. They were fab and cheered when I came from scanning at the 11 week scare having found out that the baby was still with us. Then when they discovered at the normal 3 month scan that the baby had died the previous week (at 12+3), they put us in a side room while we waited to have the options explained.

When my last baby was born and went to nicu, they had a transition ward (closest to the nicu) only for women whose babies were in nicu. So no healthy, or any, newborns in there.

Feeling very lucky.

going · 02/12/2010 19:02

misdee Hope the rest of your pregnancy goes well. One of the home birth midwifes lives a couple of minutes away from me and is a really lovely lady. All but one of the midwives I had contact with where good - Dr's were very different and made me think if I had another pregnancy I would stay away!

dracschick · 02/12/2010 19:06

When I had ds1 it was a v bad birth and he nearly died.....as they suspected he was brain damaged they took him for a scan and of copurse I accompanied him imagine my shock when they wheeled my gorgeous beaten about son in his incubator with his swollen head from the suction his cut and bruised face from the forceps and his machine beeping everytime his heart beated into the room where all the glam groomed mums to be awaited their scans Sad.

I actually heard one twat mumto be whisper to her husband look what shes done to that poor baby.

hildathebuilder · 02/12/2010 19:12

Saffy I can't help but wonder if I was the woman next to you sobbing overnight.

If I wasn't I was crammed into a ward with women with healthy term babies when my little 29 weeker was desperately ill in nicu. And i'd been promised I'd be away from those women while still in the delivery roon but there was no space. It was awful not just because of ds, but also because i felt was destroying a special moment for all those other mums,

to be fair my epu was away from the usual wards, although it was with the women having abortions. not sure which is worse really.

but its all lack of funds, and it stinks

duchesse · 02/12/2010 19:15

dracs- are you sure she didn't say "what they've done"? It would beyond insane to say what you think she said. Mind you, when I went for one of my scans in my last pregnancy, scanning unit did have very older ladies in the waiting room presumably there for gynae scans. A lady in her 40s was called in, and I heard the stupid little trollope 15 yr old pregnant schoolgirl there with her mum and bored looking juvenile boyfriend behind me stifle a scream and shriek "Surely she's not PREGNANT!!"

LadyInaManger · 02/12/2010 19:27

I had to sit in a room with a TV programme (Trisha) whose title read "i'm pregnant and i don't want the baby" whilst i waited for my D&C after losing a much long for baby - words could not describe how i felt, it still haunts me sometimes Sad

wewishyouamerrylissiemas · 02/12/2010 19:28

Its shit. all of my scans have been with the "normal" scans, ive been told that once again ive miscarried, given a leaflet (that i know off by heart) and sent back out into a room where a teenager is moaning that she is having a boy when she wanted a girl. tbf though, my last mc the MW was ace. she took me into a side room to tell me (rather than blurting it out while ive got my legs akimbo and my bum raised) and kept me there for 35 minutes while i tried to compose myself.

when i had my ep i was on a ward with "problem pgs" too. twas great having a junkie call me a lucky bitch because i'd been able to get rid of the thing AND i was getting grade A drugs too. yep, all luck!

lillybloom · 02/12/2010 19:41

AnyFucker, I was the same as you. When I was threatening a m/c with my DS2 I was put in a ward with patients in for terminations. Thankfully, DS2 was ok but that was the longest night of my life, listening to the others talk to each other about why they weren't having their baby and I thought I was losing mine.

I had a 2nd m/c in 2009. I was the same hospital but was treated totally differently. My dh and I were the only people in the waiting room once others arrived we were taken to a seperate area to wait. I actually phoned the nurse a month later to tell her how good she had been to me.

MumNWLondon · 02/12/2010 19:50

I have been to 2 different london hospitals - scan (20 week/6 week/34 week) was in the hospital x-ray/ultrasound department so all sorts of people waiting for all sorts of things. Some where clearly not pregnant, having scans for other reasons. Scan done in private room. Think this is fine surely?

12 week scan done in EPU again in private room. Again impossible to know why others waiting were there - maybe 12 week nuchal scan like us or maybe ectopic or scan after blood loss - who knows. Again think this is ok.

AnyFuckerForAMincePie · 02/12/2010 19:53

lilly, I am pro-choice through and through, but I reckon that hospital stay was one of the low points of my life

ilovehens · 02/12/2010 19:59

I had my post erpc check in the same ante natal room were I'd been told my baby had died Sad

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