Positive & Negative on Coombe + Rotunda

Having attended both the Rotunda and the Coombe I cannot rate the Coombe highly enough.

Had a failed induction in the Rotunda in 2008 and had an emergency c section, during the labour the midwives barely spoke to me, not even to tell me my baby was in distress or anything. The rooms were over crowded (10 people on the ward), midwives rarely had time to help with anything (breast feeding), took them hours to get me pain relief on the second day. Rotunda has the highest c section rate of the Dublin maternity hospitals (not including Mount Carmel as it's a private hospital). Was always waiting at least 2+ hours in the Rotunda to be seen at visits.

The Coombe was fantastic, never waited more than an hour to be seen by the consultants (was public). I had a VBAC which they were very supportive of, even though I was begging them for a c section during the labour they just kept telling me I could do it naturally. The midwives were fantastic during labour talking me through it, even during the pushing stage, babies heart rate dropped and the explained that we needed to get baby out and talked me through what they were going to do. The ward I was on only had four beds and was a public ward. Midwives spent ages with me trying to get me to breastfeed and even in the night time if you needed help they had no bother in helping you.

I had both my lil lads in the rotunda and couldnt recommend it enough, my first is now 3 and i went the full 14 days over which was horrible but i have to say i went in on a wed and had him thur evening/fri morning and i was relaxed the whole time was explained everything step by step & was assured all was going to plan (well apart from the fact he didnt want to come out :rolleyes:) i was scaned at 12 weeks and again at 20. 32 and 36 weeks (im not sure if this is the norm or not) yes you did have to wait to see a consultant at the clinics but i always found them to be very helpful and will to adress any queries i had. however the only problem i had was they wouldnt allow my partner to stay with me when i was on the ward waiting for the induction to take effect (this was at night so at 9pm he had to leave but was called back at 3am when i was moved to delivery suite) all in all i would rate the hospital 9/10. my second lil fella came in a bit of a rush arrived at 4pm was crawling up the walls and examined straight away was 7cm gone so brought up to delivery suite & told no epidural however i didnt dilate further for the next hour so i was given epidural & then all of a sudden i went to 10cm. i couldnt fault the midwives on anything was so nice and pleasant, even met her weeks later and she remembered me and asked how baby was getting on.
everyone will have there own experiences and so on, only you know what type of care you feel you would want or need.

leah24 wrote: »

The Coombe is a great hospital, although I had my two in the Rotunda and ended having two bloody emergency sections. I plan on having a vaginal birth after c-section on my next one and no one will tell me different. The biggest public room in the Coombe has 6 beds whereas the rotunda has like 14 on their florence nightinggale ward its ridiculous!!Good luck with your hospital choice,everyone has different experiences of different hospitals!

You're really going to have a hard time finding someone to give you a vaginal birth after c-section... do your research and know what you're talking about and you'll probably just give the consultants enough belief to give you a trial labour, although at the first signs of distress they'll try talk to you into a section.

Sorry Thaedydal, realised you edited my post because of the abbreviation! forgot all about it... a VBA2C basically is a vaginal birth after two c sections, which is virtually uncommon in Ireland, not a lot of consultants will over a vaginal birth after 1 c section let alone after 2 of 2 of them, hence the reason why I mentioned it, not many of the consultants have the experience for it.