how do you know the birthing pool is clean at a grotty hospital?

[vannah]

Hello everyone,
encouraged by all the great stories I am reading about water births here on mumsnet, I must ask how confident you felt that your hospital's pool was clean and hygenic?

I'll be attending the whittington (anyone with a whittington water birth experience out there?) and it is such a dated old and not very clean looking labour unit. They have 2 pools, and according to my midwife, they dont get used much - perhaps twice a week.
I remember being in a pool room with my first, and looking at the grim deep unused looking empty pool thinking - yuk! Glad Im not having a water birth...

But now determined to try. What if it hasnt been cleaned for a while, collecting dust and bacteria..?
Just worried about infections...
thankyou

not sure if this is helpful, i don;t know the london hospiatls, but i recently enquired on behalf of a client, of the logistics of her hiring a pool to take with her, and the hospital were fine with that. in the end, she decided not to, but it might be worth looking into if you are not confident of the cleanliness of where you are.

Seems completely fair enough to worry. Can't say I did - hosp looks fine and my house is filthy. But if the ward looked uncared for to you, trust your instinct tbh. I assume you've decided against a homebirth?

Maybe get info from something like the National Resource on Infection Control on what should be happening in terms of cleaning a pool/labour ward,and then find out more on what is happens at the Whittington?

I've heard about taking a hired/bought pool into a hospital instead (this never occurred to me at the time) - why not ask if you can do this? Expensive of course. Or maybe a lining to the hospital pool?

It goes without saying you shouldn't have to do any of this.

thankyou both, yes I might try to look into hiring a pool and calling the hospital first.
Thnks for the link choosyfloosy - I'll have a look at it now

My friend has delivered in water at the Whittingdon and had no problem with the cleaniness of the water pools.

The one thing I'd say though is to check % of staff that are trained for waterbirths. There was no-one when she delivered the second time and after she kicked up a huge fuss, they called someone in.

I gave birth in water in a different London hospital and the midwife said they give the pools to an outside contractor for cleaning after each use (or maybe that was the liner)..

Best of luck!

FM