Avoid Adventist hospital

P

pookey

Registered User
I recently gave birth to a baby girl at the adventist hospital, and would like to share my story with anyone considering giving birth there. If you can, book another hospital, as there is a chance that you could be separated from your baby during your stay. Due to overcrowding, if they run our of rooms on the maternity floor, they will put you in the surgical ward on a different floor. This means that you will be on the 5th floor, while your baby is in the nursery on the 2nd floor. Hospital policy means that babies are not allowed off the 2nd floor for security reasons. If, like me, you have to have a c-section, you basically won't see your baby for the first 24 hours, since you can't get out of bed, and your baby can't come up to your room. Those first 24 hours was the longest day of my life, and I could not stop crying. What really made me angry was that at the time of booking, they did NOT mention that there was a possibility I might be separated from my baby. If I had known then, I would not have booked at the adventist and I would have chosen a different hospital.
 
I had the exact same experience 3.5 months ago, including the 24 hours of crying on what should have been the happiest day of my life.
Anyone else have this experience? I'd be interested in hearing how many people have been through this.
 
I almost had the same experience in last Aug. Luckily I finally booked Matilda as advised by my OG. He asked me to consider the risk of overbooking there as Adventist accepts overbooking. There was an incident happened before that ppl ended up got transferred to Queen Mary (public hospital) due to run out of rooms!
 
I had my baby at Matilda and although for the first night we couldn't stay on the maternity ward we stayed on a ward a couple of floors below. However they did let my baby stay with us and we still had midwives come down to see us.I wonder why Adventist wouldn't allow the same thing...would the security be very different at Matilda?
 
When a hospital says that it isn't allowed for security reasons it isn't talking about a danger to either mother or baby but rather a danger of the mother skipping out with the baby without paying.

After all the baby is safest with the mother in her room when the mother can keep an eye on her for all security (and infection control) reasons.

I noticed that many of these rules about babies needing to stay in the nursery and not being allowed in the mother's room started when the number of mainland mothers having babies here increased.

If a Hong Kong mother left the hospital without paying it might be a hassle for the hospital to get their money but they probably would in the end. But if a mainland mother ran away to China how would the hospital get its money?
 
Hi

I had a emergency c-section in Matilda 3 months ago and I was in the ICU on another floor for 48 hours. During this 48 hours they still bring my baby to see me 1st thing after I came out of the operating threatre and the midwife came and visit me every 3 hours with the baby for his feed.

If anyone wants the baby to be with you Matilda is the best hospital.
 
That is really awlful. the sucessful Bf rates there must be bad. What a tough start to BF if the baby is getting bottles for 24 hours, and mom can even see the baby. If you were on the maternity ward would your baby be with you or in a nursery? What is the usual practise in hong kong?
 
i had a c-section at QMH under general anesthesia (where you are completely asleep), and I, too, wasn't able to seem my baby for 24 hrs as she was upstairs in the special care ward. when they finally brought her down about 30 hours after she was born, i was able to successfully start breastfeeding without any trouble at all. (remember, it's colustrum in the first few days anyway.) she was bf exclusively for the first 6 months.

then again, it was my second baby, so i knew what i was doing.
 
babymommy2 said:
That is really awlful. the sucessful Bf rates there must be bad. What a tough start to BF if the baby is getting bottles for 24 hours, and mom can even see the baby. If you were on the maternity ward would your baby be with you or in a nursery? What is the usual practise in hong kong?
Click to expand...

The usual practice for public hospital in HK is that, your baby can stay with you right after you give birth naturally. However, I visited few of my friends who gave birth in private hospital and found that their babies stayed in a centralised nursing room at all times. Mothers were only given 4 times a day (set schedule!) to breastfeed in a room together. Other than that, if they want to visit their baby they can only see the babies through the window by presenting a card (with a number), then the nurse will put the baby trolley by the window for visiting. I went to Baptist hospital in KLN last time & I found that there were a lot of babies (at least 80) in a cetralised nursing room! I wonder how the mother starts the BF to the babies by only given 4 times a day!!!???

I stayed in Matilda & I found the arrangement was perfectly well! They have enough resources to take care your baby , check your status and one-to-one teaching on BF / lactation.
 
I've seen and heard too many horror stories that if I was to have a third and couldn't get into the Matilda, I'd go public.
I was at the Adventist for my first and it wasn't that great then (3 yrs ago).
 
I had a baby at the Adventist in August and had a great experience. The only thing I can complain about is the food but then again, it's a hospital and i didn't go there for its Michelin quality restaurant.
 
babymommy - normal practice at the adventist on the maternity ward is that the baby can room in with the mother.

Kashismum - i feel exactly the same way. I wish I had booked matilda instead of the adventist. And if I was to have another, I'd definitely go to matilda
 
normal practice at the adventist on the maternity ward is that the baby can room in with the mother.
Click to expand...

If you have a private room, then they allow the baby to room in with you, but if are in a ward (even if it's semi-private), then they let you have the baby with you during the day, but they take the baby back to the nursery for the night and would bring him to you only when he needs to feed (if you insist on breastfeeding).
 
I was put on a floor other than the maternity ward -we were not given a choice on this - and my baby was not allowed up from the nursery to be with me night OR day. Since I had a c-section and couldn't move from the waist down, I could not go down to the nursery to feed or even see my baby after the birth. And once I could move, I didn't have the luxury of having the baby brought to me by the nurses to feed; I received a phone call from the nurses at all hours - as did my room-mate who often slept through her calls (I was woken by her calls and mine) - to come down now because my baby was crying and needed to be fed. Every few hours I would shuffle my way through the hospital to the nursery to feed my baby. It just doesn't make sense that patients who had just been through surgery were forced to WALK to feed - or see - their baby.
Thankfully, we were successful with breastfeeding and my baby is exclusively breastfed.
 
i just had my baby delivered at Adventist Hospital last week and found that there are not enough nurses there. But the nurse at the delivery suite is very experienced
 
As far as I've heard from other's experiences, Matilda always seems to be better than Adventist (for O&G).
 
I gave birth at Adventist and to be honest, had no problems at all. The nurses and mid-wives were very professional and attentive to my needs. This was before the whole bed shortage mess.
 
I had my first baby at adventist in 2005 before all the overbooking. Back then it was fine, which is why I chose adventist again for no. 2. I can't fault the standard of care and the professionalism of the midwives at the adventist - several of whom remembered me from '05! It's just the stupid administration policy that is plain wrong and unfair on new mothers.
 
thank GOD for this forum! I'm due end of June and can't get a bed in Matilda so my OB says 2nd best choice is Adventist who is willing to take me but not without a deposit.

Went for a ward tour and thoroughly not impressed. The nurse who took us around indifferent, automatically thinks I'm doing a c-section (even though I look Chinese but I'm not local) and said there are loads of free formula available if I can't BF - and looked at me as if I was alien when I asked if there is a in-house lactation consultant. My husband & I looked at each other and said, "OK - thanks for your time" and walked out.

We're going public if I still can't get Matilda.

THANK YOU, ladies for all your input.
 
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