Private C section outside of London

[saintgirluk]

Does anyone know if it is possible to get a private C section outside of London? All the options seem to be in London. Does anyone know if there is anything at all outside of this area?

No. I asked the same question few months ago . Private CLU care is mainly in London area.

I don't think so. You can get private ante-natal care - private midwifery and private obstetric care, but not the actual op.

I would love someone to come and correct me if that's no longer true.

Nope, it's London or Watford and that's it, for the actual op and postnatal care.

kingston hosp do it
there is anohter one which i read on a thread here on mumsnet...royal something....sorry dont remember the name ...

In all NHS maternity units, some or all of the consultants do private care. A lot of their clients have c-sections. This is how it works. You book appt with cons via his secretary (letter or phone call). He/she sees you, often in a private clinic and then does your an care. If you both agree, he books your el cs at the local nhs hospital. You pay for theatre time, anaesthetist and his time and for your pn bed in a side room. Agency mws might be employed to care for you or you might be billed for the nhs mws who look after you.

mayhew, can I ask you where you that info and if (without revealing personal info!) you can give an example of somewhere that happens?

I ask only because I haven't come across anything at all like that in Wales, and every hcp I mentioned it to looked at me as if I was a complete madwoman. I know others on the board elsewhere have tried to find set ups like that and failed.

I think the problem is the 'getting a cs' bit, putting it bluntly. The 'private pre and post natal care' package involving a birth in an nhs hospital is out there - but not as far as I know in a 'pay for theatre time and anaesthetist' way. cs's are only done as emergencies or if there's something like breech presentation. You can't just get them agreed and booked in by a private consultant.

I would love this to be true, btw. If I could have afforded it, I would have done it.

Fruity, I've seen something like this mentioned here before, but I got the impression there are two major drawbacks to those people who might consider it. I'd love to know more too...

I think it MAY be possible, but the problem arises with the fact that birth is unpredictable and what happens in cases where the woman goes into labour early. The consultant you book HAS to be available at that moment in time and the staff also can't be busy elsewhere. If you make it to your ELCS date, thats all well and good.

If you don't... well what happens then? I think that this is why, although it theory in possible, the reality for women who want to go down this route, the options and limitations of it make it near impossible to get and unacceptable to those who are most desperate and are therefore ended up looking into private care in the first place.

Or if they want private care full stop - being in a private room in an NHS hospital with all the same staff otherwise and same facilities makes it a little pointless and unacceptable to those who want a "better" experience. And I think they still can't guarantee you getting a private room; if they are all full when you roll up, the impression I got was 'tough'.

I would love someone to tell me to the contrary and that they had done it and I'm wrong...

My info is entirely anecdotal. I have been an NHS mw a long time (England, not wales) and I have assisted at theatre lists where "Mr X's pp cs'" has been on among the nhs pts. There is lots and lots of private gynae work done by NHS cons and some of them do private obs as well.

Where I work as a midwife in a very large clu, there are no private patients. I thought that London was the only place where you could get proper private care for sections now but I might well be wrong.

There is a place in the Midlands called Mums that manage private maternity care. I think they have clinics throughout the Midlands.

I had a really good look at MUMS. It sounds very promising actually.

They perform CS at Sollihull and Heartlands NHS hospitals. The prices seem fairly similar to London Private Maternity Wings (£10k - £16k for a 'full package' depending on your case).

The catch? Seems to be this mainly.
What is the accommodation at the hospital?
The vast majority of the time you have your own private room to stay in. Some of the rooms have their own private bathroom facilities. However, if there is a very sick NHS patient requiring the room, their medical condition takes precedence over private patient status for the room.

See that's the red herring. Apart from maybe getting your own room, what's the point? Unless you're on the private wing of an NHS hospital, you're subject to the same staffing ratios, catering, post natal care as everyone else. So you're paying £10-16k to maybe not have to share a bathroom!

You can have The Portland for that.

most OBs in large NHS hospitals will do you as a private patient you just need to ring their secretary and book an appt to get things started.

QTPie - maybe it's differnt in other areas as I am in Surrey and the Ob that approved my ELCS would have given me one privately in same hospital if she hadn't approived HNS one.

I have had private treatement for son at same NHS hospital that they couldn't do at private hospital due to his age - we were just put on suregery list before NS patients. Can't see it would be differnt if OBs operated that way.

The Women's Centre (based at John Radcliffe, Oxford) do some private work. If they do private CS, I imagine the info will be on their website. Worth a try.

Don't rely on website info only - it's not publicised well. You are better off finding your hospital website finding the consultants profiles and then contacting their secretarys direct.

my question is - has anyone actually HAD a preplanned private cs outside London? using nhs facilities as a private patient, as is discussed here?

Like I've said before, nowhere was this a possibility in Wales. You could have private ante-natal care etc, but you could not 'book' a private cs.