Home from home at St Thomas' recent experiences?

[Lizziefinch]

Has anyone recently had their baby in the home from home? Would like to know what staffing levels are like these days, and how likely it is that I'll get to go in the home from home and use the pools?

There is a thread from 2008 on this subject but I'd love to hear recent experiences good or bad. Thanks

Hi Lizzie - I recently gave birth last month at St Thomas's (for the second time) - it was the Birth Centre rather than Home from Home, but they're actually joined to one another and I spent most of my time in the Garden Room which is officially in the Home from Home.

Generally I'd say staffing is much better than when I last gave birth there (Jan 2009), the whole place seemed a lot more calm and we were properly looked after. Pool rooms were both empty when I was there. There are only two but I'd say if you are very low risk and not overdue you'll get to use it (most people don't get to use them even if they want to as the criteria is so strict so I guess that's why!) I wanted to use the pool but since I was so overdue (42+3) I was 'outside of protocol' .

I had a very good experience there though this time. All the midwives were wonderful. And even the postnatal ward was nice (and it was sheer hell last time).

just googled home from home
It looks really lovely. Being in yorkshire i have no experiance of it what so ever, but it does look wonderful, especially the garden room

Thanks crazycat that's good to hear staffing levels are better. I really want to use the pool but I guess the chances are quite high I'll be overdue as it's my first baby. Glad you had a good experience congrats on the new little one!

thanks Lizzie!

nannyl the garden room is lovely, and totally underused. I have the loveliest memory from early on in my labour of sitting on my birthing ball alone in the garden room at about 3am looking out over the Thames and towards the Houses of Parliament while listening to my hypnosis CD. I made great use of it during the day as well, but that night time moment was pretty special.

Lizzie,
Just wanted to post about St Thomas's as I had an excellent experience there prior to pregnancy and during the birth of my first baby, slightly bad post natal experience so have a balanced picture of the place.

I was unlucky enough to get appendicitis when I was 21 weeks which was successfully diagnosed by the consultant on the Birth Centre and impressively removed by the surgical team via my belly button. I was hours away from bursting which would have put me and my baby at real risk of fatality. The same consultant saw me a month later to check me and bub and move us back to midwife led care and was very sensible and supportive about my desire to have a natural birth. Really excellent care. Best of the NHS and essentially, life saving.

I had a slow latent labour and found the antenatal midwives to be useless and unavailable (mainly due to the pure numbers) but I spoke to the helpline a couple of times and also went to the antenatal walk in centre which though v busy were supportive and confirmed that I was 3 cm dialated, sending me home with good advice.

I came back the following night at about 9pm and went to Home from Home. It apparently was v busy but I didn't see a single person all night (although I heard them LOL!) and spent a few hours in the garden room. I delivered my DD in the birthing pool with no pain relief and although bloody hard work found the staff superb and support excellent. I was never left in established labour and my midwife just let me get on with it, gently encouraging me and helping me as needed.

Then you are just left....I stayed overnight and my DH came back at 3 am after some sleep and we were sent home with a slighly jaundice baby that stopped feeding. We were asked to return asap and ended up on the PostNatal ward. I did luck out and get a single room and did get some very supportive breastfeeding support which has meant that I have exclusively breast fed my baby til six months (and still going) but still it really was chaos. Mainly run by student midwives as all the others were moved upstairs to deal with births. They lost my DD notes and after three days of a different midwife coming in every six hours saying "Oh that baby is a bit yellow" I asked to go home. But they had lost my daughters readmission weight so I had to plead with a sensible dr who let me out on the basis I came back the next day to have her weighed again. It was all fine in the end but really was just mayhem.

Essentially though, if you are lucky enough to use the Home from Home, it really is some of the best care in the UK and almost certainly the best rooms.

Hey thanks southeastondonmum that's ever so helpful. I'm so glad they let you use the home from home and the pool. I have heard that postnatal wards are bad in many hospitals. I suppose it makes sense that they put more resources in the direction of women who are actually giving birth but still so unpleasant to be in hospital and not to be cared for properly.

Your experience in the home from home unit is very reassuring thank you so much for posting it. All the best with your new baby!

Oh I just wanted to add that if you do go over you can still use the Home from Home (and the pools) until you are 41+5 at St T's. After that it's hospital birth centre and they will want to induce.

Having said that I managed to hold off until 42+3 by agreeing to be monitored every other day from 42 weeks. They are very good at giving you the info you need to make an informed decision and I felt in control and very well cared for the whole time.

Of course if you are dead set on using a pool you could always birth at home. St T's is very supportive of home birth. This is what I had planned but once I got past 42 weeks thought it best to be in hospital in the end.

Lizzie,
No worries. By the way, two things that might be useful to know for you/ your birth partner to know about giving birth in water at home from home are

1. Tell them as soon as you enter the centre that you want to deliver in water - they stop you going in to early as it can slow things down- but they need to plan ahead as there are only 2 rooms and they need cleaning etc. Even if its your birth plan, mention it alot.
2. I opted to have the injection for the 4th stage, however as this means the placenta comes quickly and their policy is not to have it delivered in water, they get you out quite quickly after skin on skin and make a nest for you on the floor so you can deliver it. I'm not sure what you are planning and they did help you out (as my legs were really wobbly after all that pushing) but it would have been better for me to know that was going to happen before hand.

Best of luck. Let me know if you have any other questions.

Hi Crazycatlady,

v helpful again thanks! I am also considering a home birth, inspired by my sister who had two enormous babies at home very succesfully! The second one was 11lb and she didn't even tear... I'm pleased to hear they're supportive of home birth, and I'll be going to my first midwife appointment next weds so hopefully I'll find out more about that then. As you can tell I'm quite anxious about it all especially after hearing a friend's nightmare story about Lewisham hospital maternity ward recently. So glad we got accepted by St T's!

Thanks southeastlondonmum,

I'll tell my husband about asking for the pool straight away. Someone else said don't ever assume they've read your notes.

I will let you know if I think of anything else I need to know. Hope your baby's well and the jaundice cleared up!

I've been thinking of St Thomas's, too, as I had a bad experience of childbirth and gynae care at Lewisham. Is the midwife care good, or are the sheer numbers you mentioned (southeastlondonmum) a problem for that, too?

Thanks for any extra info!

Plu I had excellent antenatal care from St T's, but I was lucky enough to be looked after by a caseload team so had the same 2-3 midwives all the way through from booking to postnatal. All my appointments were at home too which was nice. Ask your GP if there is a caseload team operating in your area that is attached to St T's and see if you can get referred. It's the best way of guaranteeing good care. My team was called the Valley Team and they operate in the Streatham area.

Having said that I think generally the St T's midwives are wonderful. There are one or two bad eggs, and when it gets busy on the labour ward there are more agency staff who may be less friendly/familiar but overall I am pretty sure you'll have great care.

Lizzie i think you'll find St T's very supportive if you do decide to give birth at home. The home from home is lovely but how wonderful it must be to give birth and be able to get tucked up in your own bed afterwards! Hope it all goes to plan x

Thanks so much for taking the time to reply, crazycatlady. I'm in Lewisham, so home visits might be a bit of a stretch, so am happy to make the journey for them (!). The only thing putting me off is the "commute" to hospital for the actual birth; if it's a rush hour, that will be fun! On the other hand, my EDD is 19 December, so hopefully, London will be a bit depopulated by then!

plupedantic- I hear the caseloading teams are amazing but very difficult to get on to. I asked from the start and got nowhere. I was out of area (just) so had to travel to the nearest community team and they were always frazzled and overbooked. St Thomas's share your antenatal care with your GP (if you are low risk/ which you need to be to get home from home). This was totally alien to my GPs who are in Kings catchment area and I basically had to beg them to see me. They had a Kings midwife at their practice and didn't really want to see pregnant people. I have also heard that for postnatal care within Thomas's catchment area they are stopping doing at home visits for postnatal care for normal births..... I don't know if this is true!

The Kings midwives saw me afterwards for postnatal care and were lovely. However many of my NCT group had their babies at Kings and experiences were v mixed.

Lizziefinch- I also considered a home birth and would probably go that route if I have a second.... (currently not on the agenda LOL). However, I was aware that the number of first time mums that end up in hospital after home birth attempts is high. I found the journey into hospital quite traumatic at 4cm - 5cm dilated and so felt the Home from Home options worked for me this time round. It's bloody hard to push a baby out whatever way you do it tbh but I got away with only a few stitches compared to others in my NCT group who had a really difficult time. And I was the only one who delivered in water.....so not sure if that's proof.....

Best of luck

Hi Lizzie,

I had my baby at St T a year ago. At my first real midwife appt I asked about Home from Home vs Birth Centre and she basically said -- don't worry about that for now. They don't really get into that until the 3rd trimester, because so many things can happen between now and then to influence the decision.

I had been thinking home birth, or possibly Home from Home, but around 34 weeks they found out I was carrying an enormous baby, and so my midwife (who was very pro-home birth, all the St T midwives are) said I had to go into the Birth Centre. This is because of the risk of the baby's shoulders getting stuck, in which case they need a lot of people on hand very quickly.

My overall experience with St T was a bit mixed. I found the antenatal care pretty good (not the classes though), but then the last month was quite awful as I had a number of appointments with midwives and doctors and they all kept telling me different things about how delivery would be handled, which made me very nervous.

The Birth Centre isn't really so much different I think, you can still use the garden room, the rooms are just bigger and with more stuff in them.

The postnatal ward is really not bad at all, I thought, and the follow-up visits at home were fine.

I think the main problem with St T is just that it's so busy. There was a lot of miscommunication during my last month and even during delivery that just seemed unnecessary and in the end could even have caused problems, so I think it's good to be sort of assertive and make sure your partner knows everything you know and can speak up for you during delivery.

But it is one of the best hospitals in the country so don't worry! You will be in good hands

Thanks dreamingbohemian, I didn't realise the birth centre rooms are similar. You get your own room for the birth don't you? Do you get your own bathroom too in the birth centre or do you share?

Thanks for posting!

All the rooms in birth centre and home from home are en suite with bath and shower. And a plug for your gas and air by the bath .

Birth centre rooms are about twice the size with mostly all the same stuff in as home from home, but slightly more equipment visible. Home from home rooms are more likely to have things like birthing balls, a sofa bed, ropes and rails for hanging off etc, but not guaranteed, it's a bit luck of the draw sometimes. FWIW my room in the birth centre had a birthing ball and a mattress on the floor for DH.

It's the ethos/approach and method of care that differs most between the two I think rather than the furniture or decor, e.g. the home from home only has straightforward labours happening in it so it quieter, rather than birth centre which is a real mix of straightforward labours, inductions, c-sections and all sorts of other stuff going on... midwives on home from home are more likely to use things like aromatherapy, massage etc to help you, whereas on birth centre they're more focused on medicalised aspects of birth (process/monitoring etc) - necessarily so given they deal with a lot of high risk labours and it's so busy.

Wherever you end up, make sure you take your own pillows. Lots of them. And a blanket. The hospital ones are vile.

Oh great I see. Have put pillows and blankets on my hospital bag list. Now I'm trying to decide whether, assuming everything looks straightforward, to aim for a home birth, which would be my ideal situation if everything went well or just to go to St thomas' and hope for the best (I do hate hospitals) which would avoid any possibility of getting transferred from home to Lewisham hospital (Lewisham's my nearest). My main fear about hospitals is being hurried and being encouraged to use drugs & interventions that aren't really necessary. Of course if they're necessary that's ok...

anyway, all your comments are so helpful, and if anyone else has stories good or bad I'd like to hear them.

I would book in at St Thomas's and in your orange book (antenatal notes) just ask the midwife to put a question mark by home from home and home birth. You can easily change your mind at the last minute if you want/need to be in hospital.

Actually are you sure you can still book in at St Thomas? I had heard they might restrict it to Lambeth/Southwark because they're so oversubscribed.

If you can, definitely go ahead and register there so you're on the books, you can always change later.

Yes I've been accepted by St T. Was surprised as it's at least twice as far from us as Lewisham but we got offered it by the GP along with Lewisham and Queen Elizabeth so no contest really : )

I gave birth to our DS at St Thomas' in December. It was busy at the hospital and due to being 42+1 and eventually induced, I had to use the Hospital Birth Centre. That said, we were moved to Home from Home pretty soon after as there were no problems after the birth. Despite a long labour I can't tell you how great the midwives on both units are. DS is our first so I have no comparison to make, but I honestly couldn't have imagined better care. The midwives all took time to discuss what I wanted (and what I didn't) for the birth and really helped us to establish breastfeeding when DS arrived. When we were there I saw both pool rooms were empty. Just a word of wisdom, do book your tour of the units asap as I didn't manage to get on one, despite contacting them well in advance as they'd changed the system and didn't automatically include a tour after the antenatal classes. FWIW, I live in Greenwich and we had plenty of time to get there, worth checking out Riverside Cars as they cover our area and do lots of work with patient xfers to St T's. We drove but kept taxi details just in case. Also have heard much better things about Lewisham mat unit recently so wouldn't panic if for any reason things moved swiftly and you ended up there.
Hope this helps and good luck!

Oh yes, we used Riverside Taxis as well, when I went into labour, to come home after, we have used them for other things since then. They are very reliable.

Awesome! So handy to have a recommended taxi firm. KittieCat did you use the car park? Was it possible to find parking there?

So glad to hear how good the midwives are!

Thanks for posting!

PS got my first midwife app today. Is your GP at the Burney St practice KittieCat? Seems like they're good at getting refferals to St T : )