Midwife & baby health check

[MummaJaney]

Hello,

My partner and I are trying to find a good midwife in North London (Holloway/Islington area); however I'm not currently registered with a local GP. I was wondering if someone would give me some advice on how to sort this out?

Im 23, 17 weeks pregnant (due in March 2020). We have had 2 scans but not a medical check yet,...

Thanks x

How have you had the scans if not linked in with GP and midwives? Are you paying privately? You need to register with a local GP ASAP and decide which hospital you want to deliver with so you can access their midwife services. Your local hospital would be the Whittington based on where you say you live, but you don’t have to go with them. You self refer here www.whittington.nhs.uk/default.asp?c=6980
Other local hospitals to you would be UCLH.

Unless you are thinking of going privately and paying in which case process is totally different.

Google Independent Midwife UK and and you can search their members by area.

Thank you for your speedy replies!

Yes- we paid privately as I was working away for the first 13 weeks of pregnancy so we wanted some reassurance and to see the baby! I was worried I wouldn't get into a surgery quick enough.
We are looking for an NHS practise and midwife so we will look into these two hospitals!
I presume they would do all the health checks required once we had a check up booked in?

Thanks x x

OP if you’re 17 weeks then you need to get booked in ASAP to get a 20 week appointment for the anomaly scan.

At this point you just need to pick a GP surgery, then you need to speak to them ASAP about being referred to the midwife. Some will just refer you, some will want you to see the GP first, but given that you’re already 17 weeks they may just refer you.

Don’t worry too much about finding a ‘good’ midwife. They usually work across more than one surgery doing 1-2 days of appointment at each and also doing community appointments. It is very likely you will see more than one midwife during your pregnancy and very unlikely that ‘your’ midwife will deliver your baby.

As for the health checks they will probably want to do a blood test and check your blood pressure quite quickly as you’ve already missed the early appointments.

Yes they’ll do all the checks and monitor you through pregnancy. I would get booked in ASAP if I were you. Good luck :)

Whittiington and UCLH you self refer online. The GP is still important so you can get things like whooping cough and flu jab.

I was in a midwife pool at UCLH this meant I never saw the same one twice. I found this a very disjointed process. If I had a question I could never get through to anyone . I think it's better at the whittington. In terms of the doctors and consultants however UCLH is amazing. I was at whittington but I transfered to UCLH during the pregnancy last year.

Why not just register with a GP? The baby will need access to a GP, especially if you get one that picks up every illness going.

Thank you for all your advice!

I will get booked in with a GP asap. So would you reccommend UCLH? I've heard so many mixed reviews!

Thanks again x

You need to get booked in ASAP before it becomes a safeguarding issue. They will want to know why you haven taken so long.

Unless you have any serious complications I would go with whichever is closer.

I found the post natal and pre natal care at UCLH awful..... But the doctors during birth were excellent.

Whittington and UCLH are well respected hospitals