To object to a 'no children under 16 on the premises' rule at a clinic?

[FannyBazaar]

I had to make a booking for an ultrasound scan and was really shocked to be told that children are not allowed on the premises.

I generally take my DC with me wherever I go if I can't arrange things around school time and have done since I became a mother. Last time I had a scan this was never mentioned and was at a place I have regularly taken DC with me although last scan was during school and work hours so it didn't matter to me.

I am appalled at the blanket ban policy because I think it makes life extremely difficult for single parents or anyone who doesn't have anyone else readily available to take the DC.

I also don't get it because every day hundreds of women have ultrasound scans in other places and with their DC present in the room or even leaving them in the waiting room.

I dare say they've had their fair share of unruly children but then again, that happens everywhere.

Fanny, you absolutely should complain to the relevant bit of the NHS. This is likely to be the local group of GPs in your area ("clinical commissioning group"). They may not be aware of this rule. They hold the purse strings and would be in a position to make the company buck its ideas up.

Candy, you are plain wrong about who delivers bad news in the NHS. GPs regularly have to deliver bad news. They diagnose a large fraction of all cancer cases, for example. It will be confirmed by the specialist, but the GP will have already used the C word. GP surgeries deal with all the miseries of human life: death, disease, domestic violence, disability, poverty and more. Kids are there, and so be it.

I doubt that a successful private clinic which promotes itself as 'child free' would "buck it's ideas up" in order to appease an NHS commissioning group. (If its struggling then it will do whatever it takes to keep the business).

If future NHS contracts insist on access for DCs, it's likely that clinics like the one the OP attended would exclude themselves from the bidding - which may increase waiting lists significantly.
In the meantime, I think the NHS is stuck with it - unless they specified it in the contract, the clinic can place whatever restrictions they wish on the patients they treat on behalf of the NHS.

FrogStar, I work on the inside of all of this. Contracts between commissioners and providers are not fire-and-forget. Providers will always listen to commissioners' concerns, and can and do act on them, well before the end of a contract. Not in every case, but often enough to make it worth the effort, and especially when the cost implications are pretty minimal, and not acting risks pissing GPs off and thus losing activity and revenue when they refer patients elsewhere.

I'm guessing this may be an ISTC (independent sector treatment centre) which will be in competition with the local hospital for referrals, so there is an incentive to keep referrers happy. It may well be complicated, and the incentives may be mixed for the commissioners as they often have a strategic need to keep some competition going locally (and NHS England may pressure them to do so as well), but this kind of change is entirely possible. It just needs energy to make happen.

As someone who's received a hell of a lot of bad news in pregnancy scans I have to say it made no odds to me whatsoever whether there were children there or not - what was more upsetting, as I always got bad news at the 12 week scan, was seeing pregnant women who were back for their 20 week scan. But you can hardly ban them can you?

I think yanbu. I've had similar experience and no one to leave kids with. I would have to have DNA'd my own appointment if couldn't take kids, and that's not on.

I've been given bad news in pregnancy scans previously. My kids weren't at the scan, but they were still affected afterwards by me being upset and my time away from them.

YANBU. But it does depend on the child unfortunately. Like all these rules, they're only there to cover the minority and it's the majority who have to pay the price. My 11 yo DD wasn't even allowed to sit in the room with me when I had my eye-lashes done (in case she picked up a pot of hot wax and threw it over herself). Even she glanced up from her iPad and rolled her eyes in astonishment at that one.