Locating a pediatrician and the first visit

turtletaylor0522

Hi! First time mom here. Having my son on the 17th. I’ve contacted a pediatrician, but haven’t heard back. I have a few questions. 

How did you pick your first pediatrician?

What should I expect from my son’s first pediatric visit? 

What kind of doctor visit schedule do newborns have?

Someone recommended this particular office but I haven’t heard back yet, should I be concerned? Should I look for other doctors?

Thanks in advance!

swizzlemalarkey

I picked a medical group that my SIL works for. We don’t go to her office though because there’s one closer, they just assigned a random doctor to us but we have seen a few in the practice. They’re highly rated.
You can do a meet and greet appt usually virtually if you want, we didn’t . 

I wouldn’t put too much stress over hearing back yet. We didn’t even contact them until our son was born.
they’re probably extremely busy with current patients and leave the other stuff to later. 
since we didn’t have a doc picked prior to him being born he just saw whatever pediatrician was on rounds that day in the hospital. Unless you’re picking one that does newborn rounds at your hospital, you might see a random one there anyway. We had no issues. 

We called them when he was a day old to set up his first appt. He was seen at 3 days old.
If you know for sure that your son will be born on the 17th (csection?) then you might be able to book his appt now. You can always call back and ask them about that so you don’t have to worry about it. 
they do an exam, vitals/weight, check for jaundice, and follow up on any issues that might have happened during labor & delivery. And they go over how things are going  (feeding, diapers) & stuff like that.  I honestly can’t remember much else I was in a sleep-deprived daze lol! Make sure to read any paperwork they give you or stuff on my chart. I didn’t at first and missed a lot of info that would’ve been helpful to know. 
we scheduled a follow up appt a week later for his tongue tie revision & circumcision. 

We also did his second newborn screening (heel prick) at that appt. 

After that, I think he went at one month, two months, four months, six months, 9 months, & a year. (For the first year)….Each visit consists of questions, measurements, exam, vaccines if applicable, and sometimes assessments depending on the age. But I know every doctor can be different!  Hope this helps.

meggyme

I’m a big fan of medical groups. I like that I can schedule to see the same doctor if I want or change doctors without changing practices. It’s also nice if there is a need for an urgent appt to be able to see a number of different doctors.

I’d call them back again and if you don’t hear anything now, you’ll definitely have trouble getting ahold of them later. If that’s the case I’d keep looking.

pajamstagrams

I just looked at ones near our house. Ours is part of a hospital system which is a huge bonus for us since we have a lot of specialists at the hospital. There's also an urgent care next door to the pediatrician, which is open pretty much when the Pedi is closed, so no need for ER visits unless it's like 2 am. 

We just call after baby is born and then they make an appointment. We didn't meet them before or anything. Just got assigned a random doctor when we called, and she's great! Will definitely request her for when #2 is born. But we've seen other docs in the practice for sick visits and they're great too.