Lewisham/Kings or St Thomas's Hospital?...

[Mrsbirchall]

Hi everyone

Apologies, I'm sure someone must have asked this before - I have the options of Lewisham, Kings or St Thomas' Hospital to give birth. Lewisham is nearest to my house, so by default, I chose there (the GP gave me about 5 seconds to pluck one out of the air though!) but I'm aware from friends and reputation that Kings and St Thomas' are both excellent hospitals and I wonder if I should rethink (I still have time to change apparently?..).

I have been to Lewisham and the staff seem nice and I know everyone's experiences must differ - I plan to have a hospital birth though so I guess it would be great to know what people think may be the best for this (ie, with pain relief)?.. A friend swears St Thomas' is brillant and I hear Kings is meant to top too..

Any advice hugely appreciated :)

Sarah
x

I had my son at St Thomas' in the Home from Home unit. It was bloody amazing. Got there at 7.30am, got assigned to a lovely midwife, and shown to my room with a beautiful view of the Houses of Parliament (not that I gave a tinker's toot about that in active labour, but it was LOVELY after the birth) I asked to use the birth pool straight away, and it was duly filled for me. I gave birth in the water at 4.30pm just in time for tea

My birth plan was respected (I asked for lots of encouragement to avoid pain-refleif unless medically necessary and the MW was BRILLIANT at helping me believe I could do it) the midwife was sensitive and attentive - she stayed with me for the whole of my labour only going for 45 minutes to have her lunch.

Postnatally: I got to stay in my own room, got good breastfeeding support, the MWs allowed my partner to stay over night, and they didn't get cross when they discovered I was co-sleeping with my baby, in fact they simply talked to me about the safest way to continue co-sleeping and agreed it would help with the breastfeeding.

I have nothing but praise for Tommies. If I wasn't planning a home birth this time, I'd absolutely give birth there again.

Sorry forgot: I don't have any experience of the labour ward at St Thomas', which is obstetrician (consultant) -led and would be for more medicalised births, and if you want an epidural for example. The Home from Home unit as the name suggests, is very low-tech and midwife-led.

Hi sarah, good luck with your pregnancy and congratulations!

I had a very similar thread on here a few weeks ago asking for recommendations and thomas' and kings seemed to do equally well- a lot of good things were said about both of them (i didn't ask about lewisham).

I have opted for Thomas' but have not yet had my first appointment.

badgerina your reply really helped me, thanks.
I had such terrible, terrible treatment at Croydon University Hospital that the thought of any hospital now sends me slightly funny and i was begiinning to panic about my booking in appointment at Thomas' next week, so your post was a real encouragement to me, thanks

Captain oh good! I'm so sorry to hear you had a bad experience last time.

I think Tommie's is very woman-centred care. I've met a few of the midwives who work there at various home birth workshops DH and I have attended this time, and they've all been very positive and clearly love their work.

The only thing that might help further, is if you can talk to someone about what the consultant-led labour ward is like as I have no experience of it. It depends - if you're having a low-risk pregnancy and would like to birth with minimal intervention, you will certainly be supported to achieve this, and may not need to know - I didn't.

Tommie's do regular tours of the two birth units as well as other antenatal workshops to help you get a feel for the place - I really recommend attending so you can visualise the place when you think of your next birth, and begin to make it a "familiar" place rather than a scary one

St Thomas's is great if you have a high risk pregnancy (based on my experiences) although in Dec 2010 the post-natal ward was awful!

Thanks for your advice ladies. I'm going to do a tour of Lewisham, where I currently opted for - and see what my instincts say.. :) x

I'll be interested to hear what you think of Lewisham, mrsbirchall. I had my DS at St Thomas's (overall a very good experience) but have since moved and am now much closer to Lewisham. I've just found out that DC2 is on the way, so keen to get some feedback!

I am 30 weeks and being seen at St Thomas's by the high risk midwife team. I cannot praise them enough, all so caring and kind, loads of time at each appointment and call back straight away. Scans also very good in my view and never running too late. Have not actually given birth there yet so will report back but despite being high risk they are still letting me use home from home if everything looks good on the day and the consultant is happy.

They have sadly stopped the tours, last one is today and nothing scheduled for at least 6 months apparently due to staff shortages which does make me nervous. There is an online virtual tour however.

farfallarocks wow that's really bad news what a shame.

But! Glad you're being well looked after, I should add

Indeed, I have all my antenatal appointments there so I feel like I know the place quite well!!

Oh no, what a shame about the tours at St Thomas'...

BR44 - well so far I've had 3 scans at Lewisham as I had to attend the early pregnancy unit there for a little early scare and they were very good with me then - admittedly not the much chummy of staff, as I've heard other people say too, but they were efficient and my follow-up appointment scheduled quickly and easily...so whilst I'm quite confused which hospital to choose from..I am not compelled to switch from Lewisham just yet based on my experiences to date...

The big appeal over the others is that it's also closest to home for me too - 10 mins on a good run and I think St Thomas's might sadly be a good 30 mins + in traffic...

It all feels like a bit of a lottery to me based on the type of birth I may or may not have... :(

xx

I had a medicalised birth at Tommies due to complications & not meeting the criteria for home to home as I planned.

I cant fault the care, they were excellent all the way through. Midwives were fantastic. I had a long labour so saw quite a few of them! They came back to see us once DS arrived.

The anaesthetists were also lovely as was the consultant that delivered him & theatre staff. The post natal ward was busy but fine. There is a lot ls of health checks etc going on so they don't have that much time to spend with you but I'm a HCP so expected this. there breastfeeding people were great.

All round good experience

I had my son at Lewisham last August and it was good. I was induced and ended up with an emergency CS, then was on the post natal ward for a few days as DS had jaundice. Overall my experience of the ante natal and labour wards was great, because i was induced i had one to one care throughout my labour and the midwives (one day shift and one night shift) were both so so lovely. The registrar and surgical team were also great and even though it ended up in EMCS i felt safe and cared for all the way through.

The post natal ward was ok, the staff during the week were great, just massively overworked, but the weekend midwives were dragons! Guess they were pissed off at being at work...The breastfeeding counsellor on the ward was really really helpful. She's there mon-fri 9-5 and available for you to just call on her for advice.

I'm now pregnant with DC2 and have no qualms about going back to Lewisham.

I had my son at Kings. Planned c section. The care was amazing. The midwives were brilliant, especially the overnight lady. I shall never forget her. They do tours too.

Agree with jules, tommys great 4 birthday, but post natal ward shockingly bad. if u end up there, do yourself a favour and discharge yourself.

I've got friends who used Lewisham and really liked it (its reputation, especially amongst the SE10 crowd isn't always that good).

I've heard bad things about the postnatal ward at Kings and Tommies but they both have well respected obstetric and neonatal units used to dealing with complex high risk pregnancies.

Tommies is excellent for both low risk in the Home from Home, and the Birth Centre for higher risk births.

I had DS in the birth centre - I was looked after for the whole labour by my caseload community midwife, with various consultants and senior midwives checking on me throughout. They were all fabulous, and I found it a great experience.

I didn't have a normal experience of the postnatal ward, as DS was in neonatal (prem at 31+5) - I was given my own room and missed the midwives a lot as I was rarely there. But from what I've heard, postnatal is often a bit of a let down after the fabulous care in antenatal / birth centre. Of course if things go well, you could go home 6 hours after delivery, in which case you are unlikely to be moved to postnatal, unless they are desperate for space in the birth centre.

I think Tommies is flipping awesome - I don't really want to move because I would love to have DC2 there!

Just to back up what others have said on here in case it is helpful :

• with DS I had an independent midwife but ended up in st thomas' in labour with a 36wk footling breech - the sort where emcs only option. Cs was just fine but postnatal ward dire so I discharged myself after one night.

• initial "ordinary" antenatal care can be a bit hit and miss BUT St Thomas' is fabulous for high risk which unfortunately I crossed over to a few months ago

• I am now 31wk pregnant have just spent 7 nights on the st t's antenatal ward and the midwifery care was amazing. I learnt that lot of the antenatal midwives rotate into postnatal on a weekly basis so I can only conclude that I had extremely bad luck first time around and/or things have improved in the last 4 years (I did eventually complain after my stay with ds and received a thoughtful response from the hospital indicating that they would be doing more training on the things I was concerned about)

• I now have to go to the hospital every other day for monitoring so yes the distance (from se10) is a pain. I am using a combination of taxis and trains. It took us c. 30 mins in the middle of the night by car, but in bad traffic during the day (eg Sunday) it can take an hour (at least with dh's careful driving!)

• In the past I have had a few antenatal scans at lewisham (I have had recurrent mc so been around the houses a bit - this is my 8th pregnancy) and was a bit underwhelmed. However, other local friends speak very highly of the unit so I would certainly consider it if I was not now so "high risk". I would go there any day ahead of QE.

• for completeness and for the future! lewisham has a fantastic paediatric a&e. they have been very good with ds and picked up and diagnosed a quite unusual (but not serious) metabolic condition which had been missed by other drs.

All the best.

Hi MrsBirchall - I had a similar experience with being asked within 5 minutes or arriving at the GP where I wanted to give birth (St Toms, Kings, Lewisham) and felt a little railroaded into Lewisham.

I'm now 26 weeks and looks like I will have a high risk birth and a c-section between 35-38 weeks. Still booked in at Lewisham hospital but have felt a pull the whole way through to switch to St Tom's.

Two things have held me back - (1) I don't want to get lost in the system between the two hospitals at this point and (2) my husband spent the past week staying in Lewisham hospital for something very random and it really hit home how important it is to be close. I am likely to spend a number of weeks in hospital before the baby and after trekking to and from every night to visit him, I realised that it was crucial to be close.

So far my experiences at Lewisham have not been overwhelmingly positive, but likewise I haven't been totally put off either. It's a really tricky decision to try to reason through, but I would say set yourself a date to try to decide by (after visits maybe?) and once you've decided, try to commit to that unless you feel really unsupported. I've spent so much time going back and forth I wish I had fully committed early on instead of constantly looking for reasons to change.

Best of luck and congratulations on the little one! Hope things turn out happy and healthy for all.

Thanks so much for all your advice ladies, it's really really helpful and great to know I'm not alone!!! Huge congrats and good luck with your little ones :)

I'm seeing my Midwife in the next fortnight and am going to ask for a tour of Lewisham birth centre and labour ward and see what my instincts tell me. Brenau, good luck with your c-section and will take your advice to make my mind up by a certain date..

PQ77, that's really reassuring about Lewisham too - my heart says I WANT to hear positive things about Lewisham and that tells me that I do think I want to stay there if I can and from what other friends and some of you also have highlighted, it's important to be close by too, which Lewisham definitely is...

My next connundrum is finding an NCT class!

xx