So what hospital did you give birth in?

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Following on from the epidural thread and seeign that sometimes your level of care can depend upon the area you live in, I thought it would be a good idea to start a thread on which hospital you have given birth in, or are going to give birth in and any comments ie - good, bad, excellent, etc

I often wonder if women get a rougher deal if they live say for instance, in a bigger City. I remember looking after a woman a few years ago who was having a ELCS after a really traumatic delivery in London and her after care on the wards made me so sad for her. She moved to the country and her next baby was born here, and she said it couldnt have been more different.

So fire away

Very interesting thread!
One thing, though - very few posters have mentioned the date of their experience/s, which would be helpful. Some places have improved over the years, others have got worse.

Unless you're planning to give birth in Madrid (!) you probably aren't bothered about knowing that my DD was born by EMCS in Hospital La Paz in 2010.

The hospital policy was to separate mum and baby after the section, with me (unnecessarily) in intensive care. You also don't get to do much more than briefly look at your baby and give it a kiss before they're whisked away after the section.
It was another 10 hours before I saw DD again (who was also fine, she didn't need any special care, despite being small and four weeks prem).

THAT SAID...
The aftercare was very good overall. The supplies provided by the hospital for mum and baby were great and you were in rooms of only two mums each and dads were allowed to stay overnight on reclining chairs. You had an ensuite bathroom and standards of cleanliness were very good.

The BF advice I got wasn't the best, but they were VERY keen for me to BF and I was given a lot of encouragement to do so (DD wouldn't latch on, but we got there in the end).

slightlyjaded - do you mean scottish Graham at Queen Charlotte's? I've made him promise to dash over to Hackney if we have another - he is amazing!

Royal Bolton Hospital for both.

DS - Delivery Room care - Just awful/ SCBU - wonderful.

DD - Delivery Room care - wonderful/ Ward care - Dreadful.

7 years between deliveries so alot can change.

Hemel Hempstead.
This was years ago. I understand they don't have a delivery suite there any more.

They damn near killed us both, first time round.

Second time round they were much more careful.

Princess Anne Southampton- was fine. Great support with breastfeeding.

Epsom, Surrey. Lovely midwife, very supportive. They didn't really explain the ventouse and I was abit scared when lots of people suddenly arrived in the room, but was fine in the end. Aftercare was fab. They let me stay until breastfeeding established (2 nights) because I didn't want to go home and panic, and they held breastfeeding 'class' each morning which helped me. (But if I had wanted to bottle feed that would have been fine, I didn't feel pressured iyswim).

So please that Stroud Maternity Unit has been mentioned. Had DD and DS there and it is simply the best in everyway. The aftercare was amazing and the place was like a hotel in that the food was fantastic, biscuits and hot chocolate at 9.30pm...........don't mind if I do!

Fab pool, fab BFing support and also had a private room with DD. All on the NHS lovely

Soory to hear of bad experiences, some are just shocking.

schilke? I think it was you that mentioned St Georges in Tooting. My BIL has just been there for 2 months after a work accident meant he had to have his leg amputated. My sis and him have no good words to say about it. Thankfully he has moved!

GLan CLwyd anyone? Has DS there in 2009 and was all fabulous - with an amazing midwife. Bf support was ok, although I did feel like I was pestering them a bit. Community midwife (the ones that wear green) that cae to the house was v good.

That said, had quite an easy birth and would really like a home birth next time. Only trouble with that, is that we're at least 25 minutes away from any of the hospitals round here.

Wycombe General Hospital. It was quite good for the most part. The only real grumble I had was with some of the night nurses. I was confused and I needed help breast feeding and the nurse was so rude it was unbelievable.

DC 1&2 at Ospadal nan Eilean in Stornoway (first mention of that I think!) where the in-labour care was amazing but then I was their only labouring mother both times so had brilliant dedicated care. I would never have managed a VB for my first baby without them (she was back to back and almost 10lb!).

Aftercare was OK - really depended who was on shift. SOme of the older midwives were not as helpful with breastfeeding as they might have been.

I was looked after in Sty by the sunrgeon there as well as I had a kidney problem in pregnancy, and he was a bastard we ended up complaining - he refused pain releif for kidney stones on more than one occasion.

DC3 was born after an emergency transfer (air ambulance!!) to Raigmore in Inverness. Brilliant care in every single way!

surgeon

DS1 was born at Dewsbury & District Hospital 10 years ago, the experience was horrendous, it was so bad it sends me into a cold sweat thinking about it, the ante-natal care was awful, the midwives were rude and unsympathetic and the post natal care was beyond awful. Please someone tell me they have improved since then!

DS2 was born 5 years ago at the Royal Gwent, Newport and even though they have a a bit of a bad reputation I found them to be ok, not wonderful and certainly room for improvement on the ante-natal ward but my delivery and post natal care was good. Good enough that I'll be going back there to have DC3

DS1 - UCLH London, brilliant no complaints. Continuity of care etc. Post natal ward wasnt fab but was fine and cant moan really.

DS2 - Whipps Cross, Leytonstone London. Awful. would never ever go there again. Abrupt horrible MW from the beginning and everyone I met there was equally awful. They refused to believe I was havign contractions, then refused to believe I was ready to push and only went DS2's head crowned and DH ran off to find someone would they agree with me, then they refused to let me give birth in the only position that felt comfortable (and I was told aferwards perfectly possible). As DS2 was coming out I started to remove my top for instant skin to skin to be told not to get too excited.... DH nearly slapped her and still mentions it. Post natal ward ok, but when I requested that the MW checked that I was feeding ok (had problems with DS1) she looked from the curtain and said "yes that looks right".

DC3 (due next week) - Royal Free Hampstead, London. To date has been good, a few grumpy MWs but the one I consider as mine is lovely. Have had a few trips to the hospital and most staff have been lovely. My post natal care has always been with them and I have always been impressed so decided to go for them antenattaly this time too.

Another in Princess Anne - Southampton here. I agree with cory, the BF support was great. I found all the staff (bar one) to be friendly and helpful. I'll be going back there if/when we have another. :)

DS1 and DS2 at the old St Paul's Hospital in Cheltenham (shows how long ago it was - been demolished now). Absolutely fine apart from DS1 was born in the assessment room as all the proper delivery suites were in use. Just unlucky. Had everything I needed but didn't want an epidural anyway.

DS3 was born in William Harvey in Ashford. Again everything happened as I would have like, but then I am an undemanding little soul. No problems delivering in the position I wanted, despite the student not having any experience of catching a baby from a kneeling position. Even ended up in a private room afterwards as there was one free and DS was delivered late in the evening.

So in answer to your question OP, both small/middle sized towns and quite happy with service.

Princess Anne - Southampton. Appalling. Nowhere near enough staff for the number of patients, in there 4 days and rarely had any obs taken, almost killed me during delivery and the first question I was asked when back on the ward was "are you going to sue us?"

Nothing would get me back in that excuse for a hospital again.

Home - Community midwives from the Addenbrookes/Cambridge team brilliant both times,

N&N Norwich 2x
2005 - long labour with epidural in the end, midwifes were great in labour suite, but postnatal ward was crowded and noisy, couldn't sleep and missed the food coming round - left tired and hungry while breastfeeding baby.

2008 - came in for induction in the evening, had to wait to next morning, when labour had started by itself. I kept telling several people but felt they didn't pass on the info, I felt ignored. Moved to labour suite with strong contractions and was told they would break waters and then I should walk around the hospital for 2 hours??? I asked for gas&air and was told - 'already?'. Asked for epidural straight after waters were broken, a doctor was here within minutes, but it was too late, as baby was imminent - very fast labour. I went straight home a couple of hours later as I couldn't face another sleepless night in that noisy ward.

Huddersfield royal infirmary birth centre. Fanbloodytastic.

Royal Glamorgan in Llantrisant both times (5.5 and 3.5 years ago), one was an inductins the other a spontaneous labour and delivery.

Both times the care I had was excellent, though assistance was not as forthcoming 2nd time around. That was fine by me though, as I had an idea what I was supposed to be doing 2nd time around and the other 5 in my room were all 1st time Mums.

It was clean, food was ok, visiting was strict but the hours were pretty generous, seemed to be enough staff and they were all lovely.

dd1 Homebirth with community midwives from Bronglais Hospital, Aberystwyth. My Community midwife was great but she was not on call at the time I went into labour. Waters broke at 11pm, midwife on call came along then left me around half an hour later. Laboured all night by myself, thought I did really well being my first and all. Called her up at around 7.30am to say contractions had really started moving, she sounded pissed off and then commented that 'well, she would have to get up in 10 minutes or so anyway', so wasn't too impressed. Cold woman - luckily my own midwife turned up around 1.5 hours before dd was born. Fist midwife getting pissed with me for not pushing 3 times on each contraction even though I didn't feel that I had enough energy left in me to do 3 big pushes. Felt lucky that I had my named community midwife in the end but wish the first one was not on call.

ds Homebirth with community midwives from Telford, No problems with care. Left me alone until 42 weeks with not too much pressure to be induced until 42+1. Just daily monitoring after 41 weeks which was fine. ds born at 42 weeks with a supervisor midwife who I had never met before, but luckily we got on great. Convinced me to change my birth plan though during labour which now I wish I hadn't agreed to.

dd2 Nightmare community midwives from Telford. Policy changed between ds and dd2 and huge pressure to be induced after 40+10 even booking a date at Shrewsbury to be induced. Bitch midwife on WANDA unit Telford was horrible using emotional blackmail to try and get me to be induced. Hope she's retired now because I wouldn't want her care inflicted on any other woman. Ironically midwife on Induction Unit Shrewsbury was the nicest to me telling me to calm down or I wouldn't go into labour because adrenalin stops labour. Another horrible midwife making me wait 30 mins for a sweep on a very quiet Sunday afternoon with no other real work to do, didn't even introduce herself to me before doing a sweep. Bad care all round. Went into labour at 42+2 but dd2 passed meconium as soon as labour started. Even though heart rate was fine had to be transferred to Shrewsbury, Consultant Unit. Midwives there did not bat an eyelid that I was 42+2, dd2 not in distress for one minute as constantly monitored. Ended up very positive experience because I met 2 really lovely midwives. My main midwife even came up to me when I left the hospital around 6 hours later to say it was a pleasure looking after me. What a turnaround from the bitches in Telford. I never swear on MN but it still makes me angry 5 years later and wish I had formally complained about 2 midwives. It's the only way things could change.

Wow that was an essay.