Anyone else paranoid about going to hospital for midwife apps?

[maria2bela]

I'm struggling with the thought that we've been told to self isolate and socially distance for 12 weeks, but walk right into a hospital where you could come into contact with healthcare providers who are dealing with coronavirus patients etc, and also have midwifes taking your bloods and perhaps touching your belly etc, and they may have just had contact with a pregnant mum who has the virus but it asymptomatic.

Surely there needs to be some extra measures taking place?

I guess we just have to trust that the health care professionals are following the guidelines and sanitising and washing their hands, which I do. It's really important to attend these things, it's best for baby and us.

What extra measures would you suggest?
I have faith that my maternity unit at the hospital is doing everything they can to prevent infection for anyone.

I was worried about the same thing as my midwife clinic is in this giant health centre, so I called the midwives and they said they're are moving all non essential midwife appointments to phone calls.
So my 16 week appointment is over the phone.

I'm medium risk so will still be seeing my obstetrician at the antenatal clinic at the hospital. I figured that one was pretty essential so I'm just going to take it on and be really careful with what I touch when I'm there.

Unfortunately whilst I am certain that each individual midwife is doing her absolute best to prevent infection, hospitals are not presently supplying adequate PPE.

Workers are being told that only a surgical mask is necessary for suspected Covid-19 sufferers and only a surgical mask is necessary for confirmed cases unless an aerosol generating procedure is taking place.

The utter hypocrisy is off the scale mind blowing.

If there isn’t enough PPE then tell us.

But don’t lie to us and say ‘you don’t need it’.

I was thinking this. This week I have a scan and a midwife appointment.
The scan I'm not too worried about as it's in the Harris birthright centre separate from the main hospital and only for pregnant woman who hopefully are all being extra careful. It's a bus and two train rides away usually as nowhere to park.
My mum is going to drive me and wait outside in the car- not ideal social distancing but better than going on the train. DH has to work and watch the kids while I go.
The midwife appointment is right next to a mini a&e walk in centre which worries me a bit.
Do your wee sample at home and take it with you and don't drink a lot so you don't have to use the toilets, take hand gel and plan your visit and travel to appointments as best you can to avoid other people. It's all we can do!

Just spoke to my midwife about this. She said she will call me the day before my appointment next week to make sure I don’t have any symptoms. She’s also asked me to attend alone to reduce the number of people entering the GP’s surgery. They’re doing all they can do, antenatal appointments are very important so please do attend.

The only midwife appointments I had at the hospital were scans and gestational disbetes test. Everything else was in the community.

I'm sure they will cancel if they think there's a risk. I had pre eclampsia (no symptoms) that the midwife could tell from my obs, I might not have noticed until it was too late, please go in if you don't have symptoms. Appreciate it is scary though.

I'm planning on doing most of mine over the phone. I already have a blood pressure monitor and they gave me some sticks to check the protein in my urine.

I went for one this morning. The receptionist was calling people asking them if they would prefer to have a telephone consultation.

I needed to speak to a midwife face to face but my chair was 2m away from her.

There was a barricade of chairs between the reception and people coming in. All the chairs in the waiting room were spaced 2m apart.

Posters everywhere saying pregnant women must only be accompanied by one well adult. Absolutely no children.

A woman arrived with her entire family (FFS!) and they were promptly sent away.

I think the hospitals are doing their best.

I’ve just had a call advising that all my midwife appointments will now be by phone. No idea how they will do bloods, blood pressure, protein checks etc. Maybe they won’t?!

I’m supposed to be consultant led to due a previous birth injury so feeling rather stressed about this now.

Have my booking appointment (by phone) on Friday so will find out more then I suppose.

Incy that's a good point. Checking for pre-eclampsia is vital at appointments! You should definitely query.

Yes I'm worried about this. Especially because I have a pregnant friend that rang up saying she had symptoms but she was told to go in as normal! But I've weighed it up in my head and decided anything that could be missed at appointments like diabetes or pre eclampsia may be more dangerous than the virus.

@incy I'm obstetrician led too, those appointments are going ahead face to face at my hospital.
My midwife appointments at the clinic are now over the phone but all the blood pressure/urine/bloods will be done by obstetrician.
I'm high risk for preclampsia and low birth weight, just for context.

They are taking precautions. Had an appointment today as recently diagnosed with gestational diabetes and they're changing a lot of the pathways and typical appointment schedule so that you (i) have fewer appointments and (ii) have more telephone consultations. Also encouraged to come in by yourself and not allowed to bring any children with you, which makes a huge difference to how many people are waiting nearby.

They can't do that for everything so some of the screening will need to be in person. For example, they need to do blood pressure every now and again (to catch preeclampsia) and there are some blood and urine tests they can't do remotely.

The other thing is that home visits might be available - I opted initially to use a community team where the midwife did all of my appointments at my house (would have been a home birth). Can't use them anymore unfortunately as high risk but that might be an option and the woman I spoke to today said they might explore doing a bit more in home as the situation progresses.

The whole thing is not ideal at all - and the birth is a whole different thing to worry about - but I think they are doing what then can realistically.

@stormciara, I appreciate you may feel that way but some of us don't have have much choice and that's not a very helpful comment for those of us that are already feeling quite anxious.

I agree with previous posters. The hospitals are doing the best they can and really minimising the risks for us all. It’s all about weighing up the risks, to be GD or pre eclampsia, problems with the baby are a greater risk than catching Coronavirus. h I agree it is scary and not ideal but I certainly want to be monitored.

Sorry @anotherypasswordtoremember you're right, I've reported my post - sorry everyone was having a wee freak out but will try not to share it

yes i have my 20week scan on wednesday and am TERRIFIED. i am planning on wearing disposable gloves and will have a scarf covering my face.. will try to not get too close to anyone which is easier said than done in hosp corridors.. its shit.

I had my glucose tolerance test today (my mum is diabetic) and whilst I trust the staff to wash hands I had to sit in a packed waiting room for 2 hours ! Literally nearly all seats were taken so we were all sat next to each other which I did think was rather stupid since we are supposed to be distancing they could of spaced out the number of appointments to avoid so many waiting together for so long.

Don't worry @StormCiara, hope you're doing ok x

I’ve been told today that my 25 week midwife appointment will be cancelled and I won’t see a midwife until I’m nearly 30 weeks 😢 . I know from others that they are having severely reduced appointments towards the end of pregnancy and that they will be cancelling the 16 week appointment too (so no appointment with midwife between booking and 28 weeks). In London where things are considerably worse and more stretched but it’s so worrying.

Can’t help but worry things could be missed, otherwise why have this routine appointments throughout your pregnancy. I actually wondered about getting my own urine test strips and BP machine but have no idea how to interpret the results.

I’m just sorry we are all in this position.