Duchess of Kent Children's Hospital?

nicolejoy

nicolejoy

Registered User
I was just wondering if anyone has any experience with DK children's hospital in Sandy Bay? It looks like I'll be taking my daughter there for many of her medical issues, in particular orthopedic issues. Been doing a bit of research and of course their own website talks about how wonderful the hospital is. I know it's a public hospital - does it also have the long waits etc that the other public hospitals have? Or is it not as bad because it's more specialised?

I know I'm going to find the answers to these questions myself in the not too distant future but was just wondering if anyone else had any experience with DK so I know what to expect...
 
Hi Nicole Joy

Two of my children have been patients at various departments at Duchess of Kent.

I was extremely impressed with the efficiency of the PT department, where we spent the most time. And, we did see results there.

I also have no complaints about the Speech Department.

Like you suggested, possibly because it is so specialised, there aren't the waits that may occur at public hospitals.
 
Thanks, that's great to know :) I think that she will probably be seeing PT, OT and orthopedics... probably speech too since she's got a cleft palate that may need to be repaired later than usual due to other issues... I don't know yet if everything will be out of DK or if they will want us to go through a catchment area hospital instead... DK is quite far away from us, we live in North Point...
 
Waits for appointments are not to long, quicker than QM. For Physio we were referred to a local hospital but all check ups were at Duchess of Kent.....we live further away than you! The dr in question has now left I think, but he wanted to perform a procedure on my 6 month old. We saw several private drs and none felt this was necessary. Any doubts I would get another opinion, no harm.
 
Just wanted to update (in case anyone is interested):

We've had two appointments at DK so far - the first was for occupational therapy and for that, the wait was VERY short (like maybe just 5-10 minutes), the therapist was really nice and I was extremely happy with the way that everything went.

Today we had our first orthopedic appointment and it was much worse - the wait was TWO HOURS! The staff said it was uncharacteristic and the clinic was badly overbooked because so many people cancelled their appointments over the past two weeks because of Christmas/New Year. But two hours with a baby is just ridiculous. She refused to sleep and then got overtired, screaming the last half hour only to fall asleep five minuted before our name was called - then of course the doctor had to wake her up again!

Medically I was happy, the doctor was great, I really liked him a lot and didn't feel rushed. He answered all my questions and took on board everything that I had to say - the actual appointment was great... it was just the wait that was long...

Hopefully it is true that the wait won't usually be so long because I don't think I could handle too much of that... but we'll see.

We have our first physiotherapy appt next week, we'll see how that one goes... I think it will be more like the OT appointment than the nightmare we had today.
 
questions about dutchess of kent hospital

Hi Nicole!
it was very heartning to read Maddy's story. i can completely relate to the experience of some tactless questions. they especially hurt when they are directed to your child rather than to you.
my 6 year old son has a congenital short femur and is scheduled to undergo limb lengthning surgery at Dutchess of kent hospital next month. he is going to have an extended hospital stay of atleast 2 months.
we have had one appointment with the doctor and he has not given us much information on the hospitalisation (said it will be detailed when he gets admitted 2 days before surgery). I was looking for someone who has any experience at dutchess of kent hospital for their child.
I have a lot of questions - if you could please help me with these:
we live in discovery bay which is quite far from the hospital. did you take up a place close to the hospital during Maddy's stay? what are the options available? (the hospital has not been very helpful on this)were you allowed to stay with her at night?
any tips or advice about the hospital. anything at all.
please help, as the date of surgery draws closer I am panicking!
 
Hi,

Actually Maddy hasn't stayed at DK hospital - we have been there for outpatient appointments (many many of them, with physio, occupational therapy (two different kinds) and ortho doctors - and also with the social worker there) and have had one inpatient stay for some tests, but she was given home leave for the one night so she didn't stay there.

I'm not sure whether they have room for the parent to stay although I would guess that they do not have that option available. MAYBE for infants but I would doubt that it would be available with older children. Actually, Maddy will need a surgery in about a year that will be done at QMH but I think even for that, I think they will want to keep her and not allow me to stay with her (and she'll be 18-24 months old at the time). I haven't confirmed that with them, but just that's how the HK system seems to work unfortunately.

DK is an extremely good hospital for orthopedic issues like your son's short femur and they do limb lengthening all the time. They have even mentioned it to me for Maddy - although I don't think we will go that route with her. From what I know about the surgery, it is quite painful and requires a long rehabilitation time - and in her situation, it may do more harm than good. But if he is to have the surgery in HK, DK is the place to do it.

We live in North Point and even with all of our outpatient appointments there, it gets quite tiring going back and forth all the time. I have considered when our lease is up looking for a new place around Pok Fu Lam just to be closer to the hospitals (both QMH and DK) but we've always lived on the other side, all our friends are there, my older daughter's kindy is there... but it WOULD be nice to be closer, particularly if/when she needs surgeries or other hospitalisations...

I know that may not answer all your questions - if you have more questions or just want someone to talk to please email me - I'm out of HK at the moment so I haven't been reading the forum very much... my email address is nicolejoy81(at)gmail.com
 
Thank you Nicole. will email you shortly - just to talk...
in the meantime if anyone has taken up accomodation like a service appartment close to duchess of kent hospital, please reply!
thanks
 
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