Best hospital to deliver in DC area
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Anonymous
| Fascinating to see how people here just love to fight with one another. Don't you all have better things to do? |
Anonymous
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I’m amused by these people who complain about fear mongering in regards to NICUs and then go on to do the exact same thing about teaching hospitals. I gave birth at two different teaching hospitals. Almost all of the women in my family are nurses and almost all work at teaching hospitals. Do you know who they complain about? It’s not the residents or med students, it’s the attendings who think they’re God’s gift and regularly ignore nurses’ intuition about a patient who is about to go south—especially when doing something would be inconvenient for them. My mom worked for 40 years in an ICU and always liked the majority of the residents that came through because they were still eager to get things right, try new approaches, listen to advice etc and didn’t believe they’d seen it all and knew everything. And they are adults with medical degrees—let’s not forget that.
And med students don't dictate your care; they’re there to listen and learn. When I was in L&D and postpartum I found all of them to be exceptionally intelligent and compassionate people and my first birth had several unusual features/side effects so I’m pretty sure every OB sent their med student in to see me at one point or another to learn so I got to meet a lot. Not only was it not a burden to be checked on, in at least one instance it was a med student who suggested a referral to a specialist might help and a nurse concurred. It ended up being a huge help for me but the OB that day basically shrugged and approved it but never would have suggested it herself so I would have continued to suffer without that med student thinking outside the “normal L&D box.” |
eozdag
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| The best hospitals in DC area are Sibley and INOVA Fairfax. My source for this are a few doctors I know personally as friends (an ICU doc, 2 OBGYNS) who themselves either delivered their children there or have worked in those hospitals. The consensus among doctors in this area, they tell me, is - Fairfax: great for both mom and baby, especially if complications arise, there is a lot they can do to save both mom and baby. Sibley: good for moms, but even better for baby if complications arise. they put a lot of emphasis on the baby and less on the comfort of mom, but still of course the care is exceptional. These are the best two hospitals in this area, hands down. If you can swing it, Johns Hopkins in Baltimore is also amazing. |
Anonymous
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What about the statistics here? https://www.leapfroggroup.org/hospitals/search/list/location/Washington%2C%20DC%2020008%2C%20USA/15
Inova Fairfax and Sibley don’t seem better than GW or Georgetown. Is it patient selection? More high risk cases going to the former and increasing the c-section rates? |
Anonymous
Oh yes there are! I’ve only heard horror stories about GW. Sibley and Shady Grove get consistent great reviews. |
Anonymous
| Thoughts on GW? Notice hardly a Anyone has mentioned it. Have a friend who delivered there twice and recommended it to me. |
Anonymous
| Search threads on GW and you’ll see why many aren’t recommending it. Signed, a mom who had my first there and would never, ever return to that hospital |
Anonymous
Do you really think a C section rate is the only marker of a quality hospital? How about how many moms and babies they’ve lost? Their patient satisfaction scores? Their CAUTI rate? Their infection rate? How often women return to the hospital for future deliveries? Their postpartum Hemorrhage protocols? How many near misses they have? Etc. etc. Way too many variables at work to boil it down to one measly KPI that can be largely influenced by patient demographics and the level of care the hospital offers (ie like for instance rural community hospitals Will likely have low section rates because all their complex patients get transferred to larger hospitals with more support and resources to handle the needs of those patients, hence their C-section rates will be logically higher). Leapfrog also acts like a C section is the worst thing that can happen to a mom. Except it’s not. Infant death, brain damage or cerebral palsy resulting from oxygen deprivation (who can be caused by NOT doing a timely C section), maternal deaths, etc. are far worse outcomes. Don’t be skewed by people with a natural birth agenda trying to convince you that the only thing that matters is which way the baby comes out because it is just not. |
Anonymous
+1 and both of my pregnancies ended up with complications, though we hadn't been expecting that at all when we chose a practice there; I credit them for saving us, especially the NICU. Amazing people. |
Anonymous
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Anonymous
| Sibley has a special care nursery. It’s a grade down from level 3, because the hospital doesn’t have other 24-7 facilities required for the NICU designation, like interventional radiology, I believe. My MFM at Sibley and my OB who deliver there say only about once every few years is a baby born with complications so extreme that they have to be transferred to a Georgetown. They say the are fully prepared to care for babies born after 34 weeks. The neonatologists who staff Sibley also work at Georgetown. The way people talk on these boards you would think these types of rare, unexpected transfers happen every week. In truth it’s extremely rare. You’re much more likely to have other complications or issues with your delivery than this. |
Anonymous
I really like the GW MFA practice, and they have offices in Bethesda and DC. They are top-notch from a medical perspective, my first delivery went well there (even though my son had complications with his heart rate during the birth, they handled it well), and their MFMs are awesome, if you have any issues. It was important to me to give birth in a hospital that could deal well with medical trauma for the mom, if something went wrong, and for the baby. The size of the postpartum recovery room was not a big priority for us (it’s not a hotel, it’s a hospital, and the goal is to go home). |
Anonymous
GW is where recent DC transplants have their babies because it’s metro accessible. |
Anonymous
Ha. What? This is such a weird comment. |
Anonymous
I really liked GW. I had my first there, and it was a great experience. The doctors and nurses were amazing, and everything went well. I’m having my second there as well. (Note: I am not a recent DC transplant, and selected it after research and speaking with friends, not metro accessibility). |