[Gumboots]

Hi

I have a question about paediatricians at the birth etc in HK. As is normal (I think?!) my doctor has a paediatrician who is present at the birth to check on the baby etc and then does the newborn checks/vaccinations over the next couple of days as well.

I have the name and contact details of that doctor and planned to call to have a quick chat about what vaccinations the doctor would give the baby at the hospital/what their normal vaccination schedule is etc.

Is there anything else that I should also ask about? I.e. anything that I would want to know about in advance and have a chance to think through?

I'm comfortable that for a lot of the standard tests etc, the doctor can just talk me and my husband through them at the time.

Any thoughts? Thanks in advance!

cheers

[C bebe]

oh, so i guess we don't get to choose which pediatrician? do we just go along with our obstetrician's choice of pediatrician? i thought about this briefly but put it aside since it won't be for several more months.

i'll be looking forward to other mums' responses too. =)

[Gumboots]

Hi C bebe

I think you have the right to choose your paediatrician for the birth. For me, my dr has one he recommends and, as I have seen good comments on that paediatrician, I am happy to take the simplest path and use him rather than find my own!

cheers

[shoni]

As far as I am aware you dont 'need' to have a padeatrician present at the birth unless there are complications - C section - or baby gets distressed during labour. I discussed this with my OBGYN yesterday. She has a padeatrician that will be called if need be as I don't have my own one. You also pay an additional fee to have the padeatrician present at the birth, with Central Health I have been told that the fee for being present at the birth is $3,800 and then daily visits are $1,200 per day. Vaccinations extra.

Think there is also a vaccination schedule on this site somewhere, my Dr's suregery has one on the wall so you can see what baby gets at birth - can't remember off the top of my head.

Hope this helps.

[Gumboots]

Thanks Shoni - I probably don't have to have a paediatrician at the birth either but we are very fortunate in that our insurance will pay for it so I'm going to go ahead and have one there anyway!

Did anyone have any thoughts about anything I should discuss in advance with the paediatrician?

I don't want to waste his time but I would also like to have an idea about what will happen in the first day or so with the baby - I imagine at the time I will be a bit dazed and may not be thinking as clearly as I would otherwise be :) The discussion about the BCG injection has been very interesting to me - I would never have thought about whether there were different places to have the injection.

Thanks!

[Frenchy]

My pedetrician was recommended by my obstetrician, and I met him on the day of my delivery, natural one. He came with a lot of answers before I could ask questions, and as it was my first baby in a foreign country, I totally trusted him.... The contact was good and he was very careful and came everyday if I had any other question.
If you want to have a contact before the delivery, just ask the contact details to your doctor and take an appointment. I'm sure he will be happy to help you.

[JoTs]

I had to have a pedetrician there as I had a c-section. I went along with the one my obstetrician recommended, but I didn't have to have him - I could have chosen my own.

I didn't meet him until the delivery, but he was great, talked me through everything and came to visit me every day I was in hospital. I still go to him now for check-ups, vaccinations, sickness etc.

[rani]

I had a natural delivery and had already selected my Paed, who is normally called after baby is born. But my Dr bullied us into calling a friend of his. Wish I hadn't given in, cos the Dr was young and inexperienced. He said that there was something wrong with baby and called a specialist and wanted to run a number of tests. We refused and took baby to our Paed, the day after being discharged. A simple x-ray confirmed he was fine.