Queen Charlotte's - private or NHS? Any experiences welcome!

[VickyU]

Hi there all, this is my first post on Mumsnet and have learnt so much from you all already!

I am 8+3 weeks pregnant with my first and am already a regular outpatient at Hammersmith Hospital as I have a kidney disease. So... Queen Charlotte's is attached to Hammersmith so as you can imagine, I didn't have any option on my maternity hospital! Especially as I have to stay on some pretty terrifying medication during my pregnancy such as pills that suppress my immune system...Anyway I wondered whether anyone on here can share recent experience of Queen Charlottes? I have been given Andrew McCarthy as my doctor because he is an expert in high risk pregnancy.

I keep reading horror stories about lack of staff and also husbands/partners being sent home outside visitor bours which I'm pretty sure we would not like. Is it true that in the private rooms partners can stay the night? What is it like being on a ward after giving birth? We have been told about the first come first served private room thing but not sure whether to take the risk. Basically, we are tempted to do this thing privately and are just not sure whether it is worth it. We have been told that this could be really quite expensive for us because of my health issues.

Any advice/experiences would be massively helpful.

Thanks x

Congratulations on your pregnancy. Mr McCarthy is WONDERFUL, you will be in great hands. I've had two high risk pregnancies and been in his care and cannot speak highly enough of him, he delivered my DD in May this year, and my DS in 2008.

My care was private, and the private ward (Stanley Clayton) is good. There is only eight rooms and the staff are great, and have a lot of time to help in what ever ways you need, such helping you bath after a csection, breast feeding, changing baby, taking baby for you to have some sleep etc. it is very much up to you how much or how little help you want, and yes partners can stay over night.

It is expensive though and once you're out of the NHS system absolutely everything is charged for, all drugs, blood tests, scans etc, so it can easily all add up. I think total including absolutely everything my bill came to around £10k, but Medical insurance have paid about £4k due to medically necessary csection. From what I understand if you they have spare room you can just pay for the private room, but it just depends how full they are, when I was there in May they were completely full 3 of the 5 nights I was staying there.

Best of luck for the rest of your pregnancy

X

I would say NHS for as long as possible and then go private at the end for delivery if you can afford it. I'm at QC for my second baby on the NHS and saw Andrew McCarthy just today. It was a short appointment and he seemed very knowledgeable, reasonable and straightforward.

With my first child I would say the medical care I received was excellent (the labour and then emergency caesarean) but the postnatal care was not. It wasn't horrific but you are not a priority and I had one downright nasty midwife when I felt very vulnerable after a c section. I also had some lovely ones.

I was in a four person room and found it hard to sleep/heal with all the noise etc. I also thought another woman who had had twins and was opposite me was treated poorly. She'd had also had a section and was reprimanded by a nurse for not seeing to her babies fast enough at night. She threatened to self discharge and they changed their attitude very quickly!

If I could afford to go private at the end I would.

Thank you so much for your messages. It is so useful to hear about your experiences. Does anyone know what is the best time to switch to private?

Helenlouisey - could you possibly break down the 10k cost? Our Bupa cover doesn't cover pregnancy at all but I've read on other threads that private care is more like 20k which I guess is more like what we were expecting. Did you go private from day 1?

Thanks so much

Vx

Hi

I went private from day one, consultant fees are around £6k, all my bloods and scans have come to approx £2k and then hospital stay approx £3k so actually just under the £11k mark. The problem is that you don't know how many scans/ blood tests or nights in hospital you'll need so exact costs are a bit unpredictable. I would be surprised if you managed to run up a £20k bill. Why don't you give the admin lady a call and have a chat, PM me if you'd like her contact details.

X