Would you go to a hospital that's 1-2 hours away from you? Antenatal & Childbirth

[EasterBunny7]

Hello. A hypothetical for me at the moment but I have had bad experiences with the local hospital and other hospitals close don't have great CQC ratings. Is it unrealistic to consider hospitals that are 1-2 hours away from me? I imagine I could deal with the journey during the pregnancy for check ups, but am I dreaming if I think I could make it that far for childbirth?

In my area, anyone with certain conditions has to, as that's the hospital with the NICU. (This includes me, but I'm almost certainly heading for a planned section, so less of an issue for me.)

I think it's doable, though I'd caution you that if you end up with a pregnancy that leads to lots of appointments, you might regret how much time you spend travelling for those! I've just been transferred officially to the further away hospital for my care, which means every growth scan will now wipe out half a day or more of my life. (Hoping I might wrangle a transfer back after the next scan tbh!)

I’m in a similar position- the CQC rating for my nearest hospital is ‘Requires Improvement’ with some pretty poor statements made about safety. It’s my first so I’d be really nervous about a home birth but I’m worried about what my options are.

You know, listening to women describing how even 10-15 minutes was excruciating makes me very nervous. My closest birthing hospital is 20 minutes away!

You make your way there as soon as you’re in established labour. The problem with a 2 hour journey is that you’ll progress during that time, and could be much further on and much more painful. And at the end of the day coping for 10/15 minutes is a work away from coping for 2 hours! You’ll be fine

If you have a c section or stitches you’ll want the shortest possible journey home too (that’s without even accounting for the bleeding 😬

We were probably that amount of time away from hospital because of needing to wait for a taxi to get to us (only 5 mile journey but limited taxi availability). Routine antenatal appts were easy as I could drive myself so quicker than taxi but can't drive in labour! But I did have to go weekly in third trimester so that would be quite time consuming.

I was very very stressed about it during pregnancy but ended up having an induction at 38 weeks so everything booked in advance, got a lift from a friend to hospital and v straightforward! We were in for ten days in the end though and it was an absolute pain for DH having to spend two hours a day travelling there and back to visit and bring clean laundry etc.

So I suppose it depends how complicated it's likely to be, how fast things are likely to happen?