How do you transfer your AN care from one local hospital to another?

[notanumber]

DC2 is due in the summer. I had DC at a London hospital (the Whittington) I was very happy with, but we've moved since then and I'm booked into my local hospital (Whipps Cross).

However, I have several friends who have had very negative birth experiences at Whipps Cross. At first I thought that this was just bad luck but I have since spoken to several doulas - two of whom will not support labouring women at Whipps Cross because they've had such awful experiences there! - and read various birth stories online and it seems fairly unanimous that I should avoid it like plague.

The upshot of all this reasearch is, I am not having my baby in that hellhole.

So...how easy is it to transfer your care to another local hospital (the Homerton, in my case) and how do you go about it? Do you start via your GP?

Would really appreciate any practical advice on how to achive this.

Many thanks.

I transferred hospitals last year when pregnant. I first visited the hospital I wanted to change to, by going on one of their regular maternity suite tours. During the tour we spoke to a midwife and told her waht we were thinking of doing and she was really supportive and positive. Then I phoned my GP and told her I had decided to switch - she wrote a letter for the new referral. I then had to go right back to the start with a "booking" appt with one of the hospital midwives as their paperwork was different to the other hospital. Bit of a faff but I don't regret it at all. You have to trust your own instincts on this sort of thing.