Desperate to find affordable Private Maternity

[yoyogirl]

I'm desperate to find the most affordable private maternity. I have been told I will need a c-section. I cannot afford the London 10K price but have heard that there are other private wings that are more affordable does anyone have details?

If money is an issue and you aren't insured why go private? You can get a perfectly good planned section on the NHS and probably stand a decent chance of bagging an amenity room (since lots of hospitals seem to keep them for women who have had sections).

Alternatively NHS hospitals with private maternity wards might allow an NHS patient to pay for nights in a private room after a section if they have one free. I think that at QC 3 years ago this option was somewhere around £450 per night. It might be worth finding out if you can get booked at a hospital where this is on offer.

When I had my DD, they specifically said you couldn't go in a private room, if you had a c-section!

Have you tried a birth on the NHS?
What are your reasons for wanting to go private?

Really Plantaseed? I have heard that about some places and amenity rooms, but hospitals around where I now live seem to take the opposite view. Very odd!

Some units have a policy where if mothers are not kept on the LW post CS they are cared for in a 4 bedded bay for the 1st 24 hrs post CS. Here they can be looked after by ward MW's with a lower MW to client ratio so they can be monitored more closely immediately post-op. After 24 hrs most such mums can then be offered a side room depending upon availability.
I too would echo some of the other posts,do consider a local NHS unit as an alternative. What is your decision for CS based on?
Where in London are you based?

Kingston will cost 7.5k. Some really nice consultants too.

Yes, I was in a 4 bed room, but was sent home 36 hours after the c-section , so didn't have any time to have a private room, although I would have LOVED to have been in one.

Private rooms off the ward only £80 a night when I had dd at Harrogate Distict Hospital but might be a tad too far to travel .

I actually didn't mind being in a shared room so much. I suppose it depends a lot on who you are sharing with!

Save your money love and go NHS - the baby will use up every penny you have afterwards so you may as well not use your savings to pay for hospital treatment.

And if anything happens to you at a private hospital many of them do not have critical care and you will be rushed to an NHS hospital as will your baby if it need neonatal care so go to a big NHS hospital - you will be in the best place.

Madame you are so right - tbh I am no expert on private maternity care but I would say go NHS, for 2 reasons...

1. I looked at going private myself, and found that I would have been in the same hospital with the same midwives with the same care etc as that was my local private hospital anyway

1. Some private facilities are actually not as good as NHS! DH once had a major op done privately, they bodged it not once but twice, and the NHS fixed it up. Lost a little faith in private after that... even if you DO get lovely rooms.

Plus I think that the NHS sees SO many births that if anything goes wrong, you are in the better place for it to be dealt with as chances are they have seen it before.

IMHO NHS gets such a bad rap - but they ain't so bad really. I have always been very well looked after.

Thanks for all the suggestions...
My choice to go private is that I haven't felt comfortable at my NHS hospital - basic hygiene etc is lacking and the post natal ward has 22 beds. If I knew I was having a natural birth I think I could grin and bear it because I could hopefully leave shortly afterwards but not with a c-section where they might not let me leave for a few days.

The other reason is that I would know my consultant ahead of time and this I am told will not be the case on the NHS.

I am nervous and have not been made to feel comfortable and I think that if I were going private I would feel more able not to be bullied and stand up for myself...(that might sound strange but its how I feel).

Lotster - can you recommend any of the consultants at Kingston? Can I ask you if you had a c-section there.

Any details about the Coombe Wing and the consultants would be really appreciated as I'm planning to check it out next week.

Thanks

Hi there, no prob, yes I had a C-section there, under Mr Andrew Pooley. Lovely man, very knowledgable, good tailor - my scar is the envy of my friends

The [http://www.coombewing.co.uk/private-maternity.htm other consultants] are apparently all nice and very good too, and I would have gone for Miss I. Attaullah
otherwise.

One thing, I actually found going up to Coombe Wing to a private room a little lonely in hindsight, you are cared for in the afternoons and night times by nurses who tend to medicate you and leave, the midwife just comes in for a couple of hours each day. Might be better to pay for the lower priced private room down on the maternity wing for a bit more attention. The NHS and private midwives were all lovely.

i've had 2 c-secs on the nhs at kingston and my husband spent a couple of weeks on the coombe wing so i may be able to add something.

If you go privately but opt for being in the nhs wing then you'd be in the worcester suite. I was there recently and we reckoned it was in fact nicer than the coombe wing (which is pretty tired). I hardly saw a MW due to staff shortages but guess if you're private you should do ! I met a few of the consultants at kingston when I had dd1 due to a high risk pregnancy and can recommend Miss Panter, Mr Chou and Miss Shankar.

Thanks both!
Wheelybug - I don't think Panter does private c-sections I think she just works on the NHS side of things - please correct me if I'm wrong. Shanker is not available either...

Lotster - I have an appointment to meet with Dr. Chow, Ifat Attaullah and Dr. Pooley aren't available when I'm delievering.

At what point in your pregnancy did you decide to go with private? Ie: how far along were you? Can I also ask how long you spent in hospital after your surgery?

Thanks again

I think Panter may have left now tbh. She was my consultant bith times but second time round she wasn't there and I kept seeing a locum consultant and it was only t about 36 weeks they told me she'd left ! I thought she was still doing private work but obv not.

FWIW, Mr Chow was the consultant on duty the weekend I was induced early with dd1 - it was all high risk and very stressful an he was lovely. Really reassuring and went the extra mile to allow us to stay at kingston despite the SCBU being full. He didn't perform my c-sec due to nhs patients only getting registrars () - although I was lucky and it was done by MIss Shankar as she hadn't quite made consultant at that point.

Hi again, sorry for delay. I went private at about four months. Earlier the better as you pay the whole lot anyway for full care. I also hear Mr Chow is nice. I stayed in 3 nights as my mobility wasn't good enough before. Wanted to go after two, (due to feeling slightly lonely as I mentioned earlier about Coombe just having nurses, and because I missed my husband and son), but think also the midwife was keen to keep me in to delay me going home and inevitably slipping in to Mum mode too soon!

Yoyogirl, did you check out Coombe wing? What was it like? I'm hoping to look at it myself soon. I was worried to hear that some of the consultants you wanted were booked up already - when are you due?
Thanks!

the area that I live in doesn't have any private maternity hospitals, otherwise my DH and I would have gone down this route. However, since establishing that private was not an option for us, lots of our friends and relatives who are doctors have expressed the view that although from a consumerist perspective private healthcare is nicer - e.g. private, attractively decorated room, from a clinical perspective you are almost always better on the NHS. If you have the option to have your baby in a big teaching hospital with a neonatal intensive care unit, and a high dependency unit if (god forbid!) either you or your baby needed them, you are actually going to be safer, even though it probably won't be such a luxurious experience. Unless you are loaded and can easily afford it (and it sounds like you aren't, and can't) then I agree with the poster who suggests that you save the money to spend on the baby.

Yoyogirl, you probably know this already but you don't have to go to your local hospital, you can ask to be referred to any NHS hospital so if there is another one fairly close to you that is better/cleaner then it should be possible to go there.

(that was in refernce to staying with NHS care rather than going private in case it's not clear)

Watford general would be about 6.5k all in for a C/S. Would highly recommend consultant Richard Sheridan and Sarah Denning his midwife who will see you for at least 2 antenatal appointments, deliver the baby and follow up and do your 6 week check. Private postnatal ward is next to the NHS postnatal ward but with dedicated private midwives. Google The Birth Team for more info.

I had a natural delivery with them for #3 after 2 NHS deliveries and the difference was night and day, the best money we have ever spent. Normal delivery is about £5k.

At Birmingham Heartlands NHS Hospital a private C/S is around £6.5k (via the MUMS clinic in Solihull).

The OP posted in May 2009, think she will have had the baby by now