"If you have a private scan the NHS shouldn't treat you"

[AintOverUntilTheCatLadySings]

Disclaimer: I love the NHS and don't mind at all if appointments are running late. It's free healthcare and they do a wonderful job. Anyway…

I'm currently 34 weeks pregnant. When I went for my scan at 20 weeks the appointment was running 90 minutes late. When I went in the sonographer told me that she only had 20 minutes so had to scan me quickly because she wanted to leave at 5.

I've had 4 mcs so this played on my mind for a bit - especially as I had a suspicion that something was wrong.

Had a Midwife appointment at 28 weeks who said that they couldn't rescan me. I said I would probably book a private scan for piece of mind and she said fine, do it.

I had a private scan at about 30 weeks- which actually found an issue (the issue I'd been worried about). Sonographer wrote me a report to give to my midwife.

This was an issue that possibly could have been picked up at 20week scan but could/should have been picked up by midwife at routine checks.

Told midwife at 31 week appointment and she told me that in her opinion, if an issue is picked up at a private scan then the NHS shouldn't treat you and she wasn't going to refer me.

I asked her to phone her supervisor so she relented and booked me in to see a specialist. They came to the same conclusion as the private scan and I now need to have a c section at 38 weeks because it's considered too risky for me to go passed that.

Has anyone else encountered this policy? Or do you think she had a point? I could understand if I'd gone for one of those Nuffield Health wellbeing tests or something, or an ancestry DNA test to find genetic markers. But this was a scan which actually did find an issue and she was prepared to ignore it to make a point.

Not to drip feed but the reason I pushed it was because a friend was similarly ignored by this hospital trust, things weren't picked up on scans, and her baby died shortly before birth.

@Pumpertrumper

Reading stuff like this also makes me wonder if the very cautious and attentive pregnancy care I’ve received is actually a result of my husband being a Dr at the hospital rather than simply our stellar NHS at work

DH has always been quite heavily involved in my pregnancy care. I feel very sad if that is the case. Women and babies deserve so much better.

I'm not sure tbh. I 100% got better care the first time round after they heard I'd had the Harmony Test. They treated me less like an idiot, noticeably so, any time they read it on my notes and asked lots of questions.

I've a few friends who are married or related to doctors who have still had poor care, sadly.

It's a bit of a mixed bag to be honest.

@Hellotheresweet

The nhs can’t use a private scan to refer you to a consultant

The process is... referral by GP. Gets scan.
And then referred to specialist if necessary.

It needs to be an nhs scan.

So In Your scenario, it would have been appropriate to have seen a gp with your private scan, and then got referred for an nhs scan.

That's not the case at all in the trust I'm in. Doctors won't have anything to do with maternity care here - even from the get go you need to self refer to midwives.

Only exception is if you go to a&e to get referred to the EPU which would obviously not work here 😂

That’s shocking - if it is policy, it shouldn’t be. I would be making a complaint through PALS.

This is shocking and you should complain.

The issue is that NHS treatment didn’t pick up your issue, and you shouldn’t have needed a private scan. That’s your complaint, that your care was sub optimal, and likely due to the usual understaffing etc.

However. I do dislike this habit the private sector has of dumping patients back on the NHS, and not following through. A friend had a hip replacement recently, and was dumped back on the NHS for physio etc, which caused a huge issue as they automatically plan physio for nhs patients, so she had to wait in the queue anyway...

Private scans do increase the workload of the NHS as they don’t follow through to a proper diagnosis and treatment, it’s back to the NHS. Which then has to scan again etc and much of the time it’s not an issue.

I kind of think if these private clinics want to make millions off medical procedures like scans they should be made to follow through, have their own consultants etc who can then make the decisions and link in with the NHS for delivery, rather than keeping their money and leaving the NHS to sort the problem they find...