**KIMMIE1538**

beachykeen1723

It was recommended that I ask you about the St.Mary's NICU. Can you share a little about your experience?

 

KIMMIE1538

first off, I have to laugh that this post has had 45 views already :-)   People are interested in what I have to say, lol.  

 

I delivered my girls at St Marys 8/2006.   St Marys has a Level 3 NICU which is why I wanted to deliver there.   They are a trauma center, too.   I worked as a dispatcher with West Palm PD for years and from all I heard from all the police officers, if they were ever shot or whatever happened, they wanted to go to St. Marys....that's kinda off topic, but I thought it was important. 

 

It's an older hospital,not as old as Good Samaratian, but old...   My experience with the hospital was quite interesting-  the care my girls got was fantastic.   The NICU is huge, and they definitely have enough beds to go around, and was impressed with pretty much every nurse my girls had.   Unfortunately, or fortunately, I don't remember too much about it all...my girls are 3.5 years old now, but I will say that hey were born at  34w3d, and luckily only needed Level 2 -  for just a little bit.  

 

My biggest complaint with St Marys was MY care.   I felt like I was treated like ***, but I didn't care because all I cared about was how my girls were being taken care of.   I think they dismissed some of my pretty severe hemmoraging as just "twin bleeding" and released me way too quickly, not taking into consideration that I had a very traumatic birth experience (vaginal twin birth with no pain medication) and that my girls were in the NICU.   I gave birth Tuesday evening and Thursday morning at 6am the discharge nurse was in my room.   I practically had a nervous breakdown-    

 

In all, if you're talking JUST the NICU, I thought it was fantastic and they treated my girls wonderfully and really knew their stuff.   Labor and Delivery nurses and post partum nurses I was less than pleased with....  

 

Gosh, I wish I could give you more information, but seriously, I'm trying to think here, and I'm getting nowhere!   I suck

KIMMIE1538

Oh, and FYI, Wellington has a Level 3 NICU as well...   but I'm not sure where you live-  

 

I see you had HELLP -  I feel for you.  One of my girlfirends in VA had it, too.  Listening to her story was fascinating....    

 

I wish you the best of luck.   I'm sorry I couldn't be of more help.   My mind is mush.   Pregnancy, my girls and moving to 2 different states in less than 2 years has done me in... 

beachykeen1723

I understand the mush brain!! We are moving to Jupiter in a week and Cooper is going through a growth spurt (hence the 4 am reply)

Thanks for your input!! We are a long way off from TTC, but I want to find an OB/GYN based on the hospital. I'm much more concerned about the NICU stay then my stay, since we were there for 75 days last time, but that's still definatley something to take into consideration...

beachykeen1723

Do you remember what the visiting hours were??

HELLP is so weird- everyone I have talked to has had a different experience. We discovered mine because I got the worst headache you could ever imagine, drove to the hospital and my bp was 230/140 (normally 120/70). Cooper was out within about an hour and spent 75 days in the NICU. So you (and all the other lurkers- Hello!!) can probably understand my concern about choosing the right hospital!