What are my chances of having a NHS London home birth? Am I deluded

[luffles]

I am hoping for a home birth but as the time races by I am increasingly worried about being denied one. I keep reading about overstretched maternity hospitals, shgortages of midwives etc and can't help but feel that the hospital's offering and 'support' of homebirths is just lip service . I feel that they will be initally supportive and then at the last minute tell me I have to go in to hospital.

My cynicism also goes hand in hand with the shortcomings of my antenatal care so far (shared care but no continuity from GPs/midwives). Have not seen the same person twice.

I would love to have an independent midwife but it is not financially feasible.

Any experiences recently of homebirths in London? Hospitals that are actually supportive? Hospitals with current homebirth statistics?

Do I prepare for both a home birth and hospital birth? Any suggestions on how to do this? I know mentally for me I will find it very difficult in a hospital. My DH is my only possible birth partner and he is very anxious in hospitals and medical situations (whitecoat syndrome). He is coming with me to antenatal classes soon so hopefully this will help.

Where abouts are you? King's are actually positively supportive of homebirth if you book in with their homebirth team. I think I've heard the same of Thomas', not sure though.

I would caution you though to prepare for a hospital scenario - if anything goes wrong you will end up in a hospital & in more stressful circumstances, so it pays just to have thought about that a little. But don't dwell.

Yes, I was booked in for home birth with Kings. The midwives were lovely, although i ended up in Kings. They stayed with me though. Prepare for both but if you want a home birth then go for it. I couldn't believe how much abuse I got from friends and family for booking a home birth - they all thought we were all going to die! As it turns out when things got too difficult to manage at home I just went into hospital and everything was ok.
good luck!
x

I was booked in for a homebirth in London, I found that once I was I saw the same midwife for each appointment, with the added bonus that she came to my home for all of them!

Alas, I can't tell you how the homebirth went as I ended up overdue and was induced in hospital - after a certain point they wouldn't cover me for a homebirth and I couldn't use the birthing centre either. The induction was fine (2nd baby), only took 3 hours.

I have a couple of friends who have had homebirths in London, no problems.

Am booked at West Mid. Had the choice between that an Queen Charlotte.

I am ok with the idea of going into th hospital if things go wrong. I would like to be at home as long as possible. It is initial part during early labour and the thought of being denied straight away when we phone up to ask for the midwife to come that concerns me.

Managed to have one with ds2 (third child). Lovely. 2009

Not so lucky with ds1 (2005) - no midwives on night and so shot into hospital. Out within 2 hours though (with baby). Wasn't too bad. I made the mistake of not having a hospital bag - so only downer was DH having to come home to pick up clothes/nappies for ds1 (at the time they wanted me to stay overnight as too late for paediatric check up, but I wore them down).

Incidentally, 5 minutes after we left the house to go to hospital, the maternity unit rang to say they'd managed to rustle up a midwife from the other side of the Borough. So part of me wishes I'd stayed at home. At the same time, having had an epidural with dd, I wasn't entirely sure and confident of what imminent labour would feel like. And given that ds1 was born shortly after we arrived at hospital, I'm not sure that the midwife found for us would have made it here in time, or good enough time.

My advice also would be to ring the maternity unit as early as possible to put them on notice that things are happening. With ds1 I kept ignoring increasing contractions, partly bcecause labour with dd had been quite slow to start and get established.

By the time I rang, I was in advanced labour. By the time I got to hospital, I was 10cm. I rang just after 6pm and I do wonder if I'd rung at 12pm, one of the group practice midwives I was due to have might have been available. Apparently my cervix was so unfavourable at the sweep 2 days prior that none of the group practice were on call that Friday night, which meant that I was passed onto the hospital maternity unit, who in the end rustled up a midwife from another group practice.

Pain in the neck. With ds2 as soon as my waters broke I rang, because didn't want to leave it to the last minute again.

Dont know about West Mid but certainly in the hospital where I work in London we are actively encouraging homebirths, and have a team of midwives who will look after you throughout your pregnancy and be there for you in labour. In my team, homebirths take precedence over anything else, so if one of our homebirth mums go into labour, we will definitely be there for them. I think you should speak to your midwife to clarify their stance on homebirths though.

Must say that Ive only ever heard good things about West Mid tbh.

I had a homebirth last year in Tower Hamlets. It was brilliant, no problem at all. I had a hospital bag packed just in case, but didn't need it. Remember that homebirths are actually cheaper for the NHS than a hospital delivery - less need for interventions, no need to use a hospital bed. So they do actually want you to have one!

Had a homebirth (2 midwives + 1 student) in Putney, March '10 via ChelWest. As soon as I mooted it as a possibility, the midwifery team got really enthusiastic/excited and really supported me. Fab experience. Super midwives came out from hospital within 20 mins of our ringing as my previous labours were only 3 hours long. I would have had my team's homebirth midwife who I'd met at home for a couple of appts once I decided on a homebirth, except ... her car was in for servicing! Wasn't a prob at all - the midwives who came out were totally reassuring and wonderful.

Antenatal care at ChelWest is split into teams, mainly by location or high vs low risk. You see the different midwives one after another through your various appts, the idea being that when it comes to labour, you'll have met the midwife on duty from your team at least once already. I've had 4 babies now there and I've never had the same midwife in labour as at any appt ... but it doesn't matter at all - all the midwives in the labour ward have been great.

I am under a team of midwives (grouped by location) but will not see them until 34 weeks, until them I have GP shared care. So it is difficult to know how supportive the midwives will be.

Would you consider going to Queen Charlottes? They have the most AMAZING homebirth teamwhich is part of their one to one service.Incredible midiwves, brilliant care and if you do have to transfer in the system worksso that your midwife can care for youin the hospital too.

Thanks squiggley, I didnt know that so will look into it.

I had a lovely homebirth 3 years ago in Wandsworth with my first baby - St Georges community midwives were very pro homebirths, in fact they convinced me to go for it. The aftercare was also great, and the GP visited house to check baby. Good luck whatever you decide!

I had a look at the Queen Charlottes website and I dont fall into the catchment for the caseload/community midwives team. Would this mean that I would only be offered a hospital birth there?

One of my friends had a homebirth in NW6 last year, all very supportive midwives from the Royal free.

Our local NCT - nothwest london also has a homebirth support lady called Kate Clarke, you can get her details on the NCT website.

The midwife team I am seeing who are one of the local teams attached to Queen Elizabeth in Woolwich are very supportive indeed of homebirths. Like everywhere there are no guarantees, but from chatting to the midwives it's clear most of the time there is no problem. They are extremely enthusiastic about them.

My only issue is that for medical reasons I really, really do have to have an ELCS as I'd love one of the lovely midwives here to deliver my baby at home. We usually end up spending a good 5-10 minutes of each appointment lamenting the fact!!