Which hospital to choose???

[Dee2209]

Hi, wondering if anyone can give me some advice I am 7 weeks pregnant after trying for quite some time. I have a choice of hospitals from Hillingdon hospital or Watford hospital or Northwick park. I need to choose within the next week but really don't know which one to go for. Any advice ?

I don't know any of the hospitals you mention, but I think there are two important general factors:
a) availability of facilities you want (birthing pools, home from home unit, or whatever)
b) ease/reliability of route from home to hospital at any time, day or night. If one location is the wrong side of a notorious bottleneck, or has hellish parking, it's a stressor you can do without.

Don't go to Northwick park. Reputation is poor and used to have high maternal and infant mortality rates. I'm booked in to Watford. Busy but I've heard good things especially about midwife unit. A friend was at hillingdon. She had a difficult birth and said it was busy but this is prob same for all London hospitals. Watford has community midwives so you can have midwife appointments locally and only go to hospital for scan. Don't know about others

Thanks both for your comments !

i'm in the same boat as you Dee. Dont have a lot of time to think about it, but am presented with so many choices, and so many more than the ones you have listed including Edgeware, Barnet, St Marys etc
Everyone will have their strong opinions, like LostMySocks, but I have found from speaking with a number of people that all hospitals are different and many women will have different experiences in different hospitals. One woman will love Northwick and another will have hated it. Its a shame that NP has still a reputation from news of almost a decade ago, but there is a lot of money being pumped into the hospital maternity unit.
Think about what kind of experience you want from your pregnancy/ birth and what will be the least stressful as well. It's all good and well being referred to the best hospital far far away, but if its a bugger to get to, you have no car, its a pain by pub transport and hard to get to from work, hard for your friends, parents, partner to get to for visits etc, then its just stressful. Thats just one reason.
Have a chat with the different maternity units, go for a visit if you can. If not, take a look at their services online. If you find that you really hate the treatment/appts a few weeks down the line, you can speak to your GP about changing.

I'm booked at Watford. I'm only 16weeks but so far it's been a good experience. Mainly went for it because I have a friend who studied to be a midwife but now works in a lab for blood tests at Watford. She was pregnant last year and really rates it. Yes it's busy but I think any greater london hospital will be.
I definitely agree with other's comments. Have a look at the facilities available and what kind of birth you'd like.

I had DS at Watford last year and was so happy there. I had him in the ABC section and also experienced postnatal ward special care ward and the transitional unit - it's fair to say I got about lol.
A few friends iv met have complained that they didn't get pain killers quick enough in postnatal, I didn't take any so can't comment on that. From my experience I couldn't complain and will def be having future babies there. Apparently theyv just had a revamp so it will be prettier now if that makes any difference lol.

I worked at Northwick Park 7 years ago and a couple of colleagues had babies their and didn't rate it. Was also the time it got put on special measures. Not sure what it is like now but think it would put me off.