Wittington birthing experiences

[emilyarm]

Hi,

I'm pregnant with my first baby and thinking about my options for the birth.

I'm considering a home birth but also looking at the Wittington's birthing centre. Just wondered if others had experiences to share?

Hi Emily,

Im new to this site and just saw your post. i will also be giving birth at the Wittington in June and have only heard but good things about it. Great staff and clean ward. The birthing centre is new and was told is great if you are low risk and dont want to stay in the hospital; and if you do they switch you to anoter room.

Hope that helps,
Fi x

I've got a 6 month old who was born at UCH. Since giving birth I've heard nothing but good experiences of Whittington hospital.
I think UCH suffers from being brand new and so therefore really popular. They had no beds when I came to give birth.

I had 2 babies, now nearly 5 and nearly 3 at the Whittington so a bit out of date. I found the experience of giving birth there generally good but wasn't so keen on the post natal care. With ds1 I had to stay in a couple of weeks and thought that the wards were a bit grotty. My sister had her babies at UCH and definitely got more help with breastfeeding and the staff were a lot more friendly. Have also had a friend whose baby was transferred to the SCBU at Whittington from another hospital. She said that the medical care at the Whittington was excellent but the pastoral care wasn't great. So they are very good at the most important part!

hi, I'm planning on the whittington birth centre too (due in april). A couple of friends gave birth their recently and said it was great - staff were really helpful and your partner can stay overnight too. (They were also supportive of hypnobirthing which one of my friends did).
if you're looking for a home birth there's one midwife that people keep talking about at my yoga class and she's called Margaret and covers the area round the whittington. will try and find out her surname.
take care, sam x

Hi there,
I recently gave birth at the Whittington and would not rate the birth centre at all. None of the three midwives there could put a stent in my hand and they basically just leave you to it without any pain relief or intervention on their part what so ever. They failed to call my husband for four hours and I was by myself for most of that time . It was totally awful. My experience on the labour ward was much better and post natal care was dire. Apparantly UCH is much better !

Hi there,

For what it's worth...
I gave birth to my first son at the Whitt birth centre in January. I totally rate it. Staff were lovely and the environment was great. I used a birth pool and although they were busy when my husband and I arrived (I was already contracting) and there was no space, they managed the situation very well, and I felt calm...well as calm as you can ever feel when you're in labour for the first time! Go and visit on one of their 'open days' and go with you gut instinct.

Good luck with you decision!
x