Anyone had antenatal care and birth at UCLH? Experiences pls

[Sandrine1982]

Hi there. I am 9 weeks pregnant and I recently registered with the UCLH Elisabeth G Anderson maternity service.
I would like to hear from people who had their babies there and what their experience was like. Anything I should be specifically prepared for? Are they very busy? How long have you stayed in hospital after birth? Has anyone paid for a private room post-birth? Thanks

I'm also with UCLH and interested to see any responses to your post. Currently 19 weeks

I haven't had my baby yet (I'm 26 weeks) but I'm finding the care at UCLH great so far. Appointments seem to run on time and everything is smooth, the midwives are lovely and they seem extremely vigilant. They have a really good preterm birth unit which I found reassuring just in case babe decides to arrive early ! I decided to go with this hospital despite it being further from my home because I know others who have had great experiences. Good luck !

Thanks @vitadolce, that sounds great.

Anyone else who has had experiences?

This isn't really what you asked but i attended the EPU and considered this for my birth. Amazing EPU facilities, very quiet, experienced staff and the newest scan machine i have ever seen!

Yes, I gave birth last week there!

I found the administrative process during pregnancy very cold, reception staff were quite rude and I was in a midwife pool so I never saw the same person which was hard. If there was a worry during pregnancy it was hard to contact anyone.

But ... every midwife I saw was absolutely lovely... just the process around them wasn’t great.

We had complications so lots of extra scans and the doctors were excellent.

For the delivery I had a c section and they did a brilliant job, 6 days later and my scar is so tiny and neat.

Midwives on labour ward were 90% excellent - it was very busy though not the most relaxing atmosphere however it will probabaly be different in the birth centre.

I felt well looked after and that if anything happened they would handle it but it is a busy place and you can feel lost in the system a bit.

Hope that helps!

Thanks so much for your replies - really helps. Yes it does indeed look very busy. But aren't all London hospitals so busy?

Good luck with your newborn baby :)

Awful. Had two home births after as couldn’t bare the thought of ever giving birth in a hospital again.

Nothing horrific happened and me and my son came home healthy but the care was shocking.

I think they have a private wing so £££ but not private rooms as I was looking at the website.
Agree that all London hospitals are very busy.

Oh dear. Private wing probably means around 7K. Not for us :(

I had DS there three years ago and have just started antenatal care for DC2 (currently 11+6). I cannot recommend it highly enough. It is true that they do team care, so you are unlikely to see the same midwife twice, but I am used to this from my GP surgery (where I never see the same GP twice) and it has not bothered me. Every midwife that I have seen has been excellent, and we have always found it really easy to get appointments at times that work for us.

The thing that swayed me to UCLH the first time was the fact that it is the hospital that you will be sent to if things go wrong - even the Portland (super-fancy and super-expensive private hospital) will send emergencies there. I ended up being induced and then having an emergency C section, and I was so grateful for the care that I received. I was in the antenatal ward for four days (while being induced because of reduced movement) and then in the post-natal ward for one night after my C section. It was definitely very very busy - but since I felt that the care that I was received was really good, I didn't mind.

I think it very much depends on your personality and the sort of care that works for you. If you are looking for a lot of consistent one-to-one attention from the same midwife, and an environment that is very quiet and restful, then UCLH may not be for you. If you want excellent care of the highest quality with the best facilities, and are not too fussed about being somewhere busy (which we felt we were used to in London), then it is excellent.

I've been having antenatal care through the EGA but haven't given birth yet (33 weeks). It's been generally OK, but having lived outside of London until recently I've been a bit surprised by the standard of care relative to other hospitals I've used previously (albeit not for antenatal care - first baby). Like other posters have mentioned, you will see different midwives every time, and it's very impersonal. The receptionists are overwhelmingly rude and it's impossible to ever get through on the phone. I've had one horrendous midwife at the MFAU who we actually raised a complaint against (which was recommended by her own supervisor, after explaining the situation. She really was a nasty woman). This seems to be more of a 'London' thing than a UCL thing though. However, other than that, it has been good. Most midwives are excellent, the care and testing are thorough and in line with best standards. The birth centre seems well equipped. Communication is generally good, and wait times for appointments have been fine. I feel "well looked after" and would recommend in general.

Thank you @MrsD28 and @Spooples for your replies. Living in London I am also used to things being impersonal, and I certainly don't mind being seen by a different person every time. I was more worried about the ward being so busy that people are ignored if there are complications, but that doesn't seem to be the case. Anyway, they must have some sort of system in place, and I've noticed on their website that between specific dates they don't accept new self-referrals unless they're from their catchment area. So hopefully they're not taking on more than they can chew :-)

My consultant said that they are changing over from paper notes to a fully online system soon so are taking 20% less patients whilst this happens (over the course of a few months) hopefully this is a good thing in terms of ratio of patients to staff.

I had both my children at this hospital. I doubt there's a safer place to have a baby in the world - if something goes wrong you have the best surgeons which is why I chose it. However the level of organisation and standards of the other staff is a different story - and the post natal care is a much lower standard than the rest of it imo.

Also, for all these skilled professionals to help you, you actually have to be IN the hospital. With my first child they left me screaming in agony for days at home because my contractions - despite being extremely strong - were not close enough together. The cleaning ladies nearly broke the toilet door down while I was giving a sample because I was in so much distress - but computer said no and I was sent home. It turned out that the reason I needed a last minute c section (not dilating) was the same as the reason they wouldn't let me in the hospital - I am not a doctor but that sounds like a dangerous catch 22 to me. The only reason they let me in eventually was because my waters started breaking. If they hadn't I'd probably still be screaming in my house. I was so destroyed by the labour it really didn't occur to me to complain but now I really regret it.

For my second I chose to stay with UCLH after they promised that with my history I'd be allowed straight into the labour ward. We arrived at the labour ward, standing in front of an empty birthing room (where I eventually laboured) waters and blood running down my legs and screaming in agony. We were told the place was full and I had to go to the foetal assessment unit downstairs. This was full of people waiting to be seen and was very humiliating for me. The staff there took one look at me and said I had to go back upstairs - someone ran up to me with a wheelchair which they smashed into the back of my legs. I was taken back to the room I had been standing in front of 5 minutes ago.

Two midwives checked my dilation which caused some of my waters to break - I heard them say 'haha she's peeing'. I was not. There was a full page in my notes that said in large letters the anaesthetist should do my cannula - these women did not see it and did it anyway, causing a lot of pain and telling me off for not being able to cope with it. Hours later in my last minute episiotomy it somehow slipped and the anaesthetist had to put another one in my other hand. Again, I was so broken by this labour that complaining about it was the last thing that occurred to me, although now I wish I had taken every avenue available to me as I do not believe this treatment was acceptable.

I am so torn about whether or not to recommend this place bacause I really do believe that when it comes to the real danger you are in very safe hands, but is it worth all the badly run stuff around it? For myself, I would not go back there again even though I'm sure if you're not unlucky with who you get you could have a great experience there.

It's good but very busy!

When I went in to deliver it was so busy I was left in the waiting room until I was in active labour vomiting across the room (TMI ) and there was no doctor available so I had to give birth in the birthing centre instead of on the ward with an epidural as had been my plan (I had GD so should have been monitored on the ward but there was simply no space).

But the prenatal care was great and they have amazing facilities if you're higher risk.

Hi OP, well you've got a range of experiences here! I had my son at UCLH 3.5 years ago. Now pregnant with my second out in the Shires and reflecting gratefully on the comparatively excellent care at UCLH.

I was low-risk but with a higher BMI and they gave me tons of extra scans antenatally as a precaution - many more than I've been offered down here despite significantly more risk factors.

I didn't ever see the same midwife twice but I also never received bad care from anyone prenatally.

I chose to give birth in the MLU and tried for a water birth. That's what happened and it was overall a great experience. We also (by fluke) gave birth at a quiet time on a quiet day in the Birth Centre and got a private room for free (my NCT teacher had advised us to add a line on our Birth Preference sheet saying "if a private room is available could we have it" and it worked!) Not that we got any sleep anyway due to bub hating being anywhere except on my body! But it was private and lovely.

I had some reservations about some of the choices that were made for me by the midwife as I was entering the second phase, and I asked for a birth debrief session to discuss these. It took a lot of hounding and different email addresses and a wait of several months but I did eventually get the meeting and got some answers.

All in all I think it is a brilliant place to give birth and, as others have said, you have access to the UK's very best critical teams if things go wrong.

Best of luck! X

I can see this happening to many women right now to be honest. Every time I would go in I would see week 33+ women waiting for hours in the queue for a bed, some in agony and some trying to remain calm. They aren’t great. I had the worst experience with them from the start of my pregnancy that caused me to finally terminate my pregnancy at week 23+5 days. It was my first baby and they were not helpful at all. I didn’t even have a midwife or a diary given to me. “Here’s a bunch of leaflets and some numbers”. Worst experience of my life and the worst part is this was my first every pregnancy journey which was a miracle in the first place.