San Diego Babies
Options
Has anyone delivered at Scripps Memorial Hospital La Jolla?
Hello, we will deliver at Scripps Memorial Hospital in La Jolla. Has anyone ever delivered here? Good or bad experiences? Thanks!
This discussion has been closed.
Re: Has anyone delivered at Scripps Memorial Hospital La Jolla?
I delivered at Scripps La Jolla, overall it was pretty good. However, a few things I wish I had known (or at least been a little more assertive about) they are very very pro-breast feeding and skin to skin contact. So they really "encouraged" DD to be in the room and on me at all times which at the time I was fine with however when we brought DD home she refused to sleep by herself. I kind of think if I had been a bit more assertive and told the nurses to take her to the nursery more this wouldn't have been as much of an issue. Also, on day 2 my milk still had not come in but they are so pro-breastfeeding that the nurse all but refused to give DD formula just so she would calm down (she was screaming the whole day, it was terrible) and finally her solution was to bring in some formula that had a small tube attached to it and put that next to my nipple so she could suck on both, it was pretty ridiculous! However, I do think that it was the nurse more than the hospital itself because the next day we were in a similar situation and the nurse (who was great) explained how everything was working with me and with DD and got her some formula and she calmed right down.
Also, be cautious of the people who deliver your meals. Because I was sleep deprived and the fact that most the time it was just me DD and FI in the room I didn't bother covering up when I breastfed, however just because I was not covered up does not mean I wanted people delivering the meals to see me. They knock really quick and before you have a chance to a) figure out who's knocking and b) cover up they are already in your room. We ended up complaining about it because it happened twice and the nurse wrote a note on our door to not go past the curtain.
Otherwise, the birth itself was very smooth and couldn't have asked for a better delivery. They followed my birth plan which was nice and they were also great about getting the epidural when the pain was too much for me but we had a great nurse for the first part of my delivery (her name was Linda). The second nurse wasn't bad just not as great as the first. Also, it's really nice that you get your own room which I hear at other hospitals you sometimes have to share. Our room was pretty big both the delivery room and the room we were moved to afterwards.
So overall, I wouldn't change going to Scripps La Jolla and would definitely recommend it to others because I feel if I had stepped up and been more assertive I wouldn't have had the issues I had. Hope this helps and good luck with your delivery
I have delivered two babies there.
The first time was AWESOME! The L&D nurses and recovery nurses were amaing. The rooms were nice and the food was decent (though they kept bringing me some other persons food and then would argue with me when I said that wasn't what I ordered, sigh).
The second time was okay. The L&D nurse wasn't great, but not bad. She was nice enough, but not super friendly like the first nurse I had. My recovery nurses were just okay. It was obvious that english was not the first language and she kept getting frustrated with me because I could understand her through her super thick accent. I also had really bad pp depression and it was the first time I left my ds#1 (he was only 12 months old) so that may have played into my experience.
With all that said, I am pregnant again and will be delivering at the same hospital. I am hoping for an experience like the first one.
Be aware of the food and the people who deliver the food. Both times I got the wrong meals and sometimes they even forgot to deliver my food. My second son was born just after noon and I had to ask several times for food when I got to my room. Finally at 8 pm (I hadn't had anything all day) I got snippy with the nurse and said that I needed to eat because I felt like I was going to faint... and almost did.
They will also do everything in their power to have one mom per room, even if they have to move you off of L&D and Recovery floor (happened to me)
I also had a great experience there. The nuses were so helpful and attentive, it really made me feel supported. They are definitely very pro-breastfeeding, which was beneficial for me since I did bf LO, but each nurse has a tendency to push her technique, which can get annoying when you're already overwhelmed and nervous.
And ditto the previous comments about food delivery... but I also found the nurses and additional hospital staff to be the same way about just knocking quickly and entering. The doctors were the only ones who waited for my H to open the door or tell them to "come in". The coming and going of staff and nuses and doctors got old really quickly, so I was eager to get back home.
Still it was a great overall experience, and we felt supported the entire time.
GL to you!
We delivered there and I loved it. In fact, I changed OBs when were were TTC because my current OB didn't have hospital privileges there.
I didn't have any issues with people barging in on us BUT I think that's because we reflexively closed our curtain as soon as we got to the room. I really don't think anyone was "trys" to barge in on anyone, but people generally knocked, then popped the door open to identify themselves. There are soooo many people you'll have coming and going- doctors to check on you and baby, the two people on call assigned to your room checking your vitals and the baby's vitals, and fetching the baby for tests, the clean up crew, the food delivery, etc. These doors are heavy duty; if they ID'd themselves from the hallway, we'd never hear them, and if my husband or I had to get up every time someone needed to see us, we would have been irritated. No one ever advanced beyond the curtain unless they had our OK, with the exception of our on call nurse for the ONE vital check that we were all so tired for that we didn't hear her ID herself.
As far as food goes, no complaints here, either. They asked and offered us so much food I was wondering who the heck can eat so much lol. As soon as we got to recovery they gave us a whole array of things to choose, and they encouraged us to over-order every meal to keep snacks in the room, and if we asked for anything in between meals they brought it ASAP, no issues. The menu we had to order from was really diverse and everything was yummy.
The L/D rooms are great, all the recovery rooms are private (no guarantee for a private room anywhere else!).
We loved our first L/D nurse, she was over the top awesome and stayed 45 minutes past her shift change when we progressed more quickly than they expected us to. (They do shift change at 7AM and 7PM, learn that, because you'll get double visits then- people leaving and saying bye, need anything before I leave, and then the next round introducing themselves and asking the same.) The L/D nurse who replaced her was just as useful, helpful, and knowledgeable, but a little less "I'm your new best friend" and more "We have Important Things to do. Still fine by me. Anywhere you go, no matter how awesome a facility is, you may get a nurse who loves life and goes above and beyond for you, one who is merely doing their job, or one who is having a crummy day. Total crapshoot. BUT we never encountered anyone we weren't totally happy with.
Doctor of anesthesia you'll probably have there will be Dr. Petit- LOVE. Cool dude, great at his job. Accepted my offering of knuckles after an easy labor and easy epidural without a blink. Checked on me way more often then I expected the anesthesiologist to do considering there were no issues.
Yes, they really encourage the baby to stay in the room with you and they encourage breastfeeding. I didn't find them pushy on either count, just encouraging, helpful, and doing their best to prepare us to fly solo.
They have great security in the hallway with limited entrances/ exits to the ward, and a baby lojack ankle bracelet to minimize risk of kidnapping, They encourage you to keep baby in your sight at all times- my husband got to accompany to his first bath (they wait until he's a few hours old), his hearing test, and his discharge weigh-in (yay photo ops).
They brought me any and everything I asked for, including stash of crotch care goodies to take home. (useful info, FYI community.thebump.com/cs/ks/forums/1/29226774/ShowThread.aspx?MsdVisit=1).
They have free wireless and it was awesome. Not super slow draggy wireless where its almost pointless because we're all so spoiled we can't operate at old dial-up speed. It was full speed. Watching movies on netflix was no issue. My step daughter was in the room with us for delivery and most of our recovery time and Netflix access was a life saver. We knew ahead of time so we didn't have to add DVDs to our "bring" list, and all we had to bring was my netbook instead of our full blown laptop with an optical drive that's way heavier and more bulky. They'll show you during the tour that they have a dvd player and tv in the delivery room but it's a decent sized room and that tv is faaaaaar away from the delivery bed, where I was planted post-epidural.
Also, there was an outlet right next to the bed, which may sound silly, but I've seen people complain about only having outlets hidden way behind the huge built-in hospital bed where they had to dig for it and items plugged into it were super inconvenient. I had my netbook plugged in and was able to charge our cell phones and my Kindle off of it bedside.
My only irritation was it took about an hour longer than promised to get us discharges, which at the time was TORTURE- we just wanted to go home, we delivered at 830 Friday night so all the 24-hour tests had to be done Saturday night and we weren't free until Sunday morning. But it's not like they forgot about us, they just had an influx of patients delivering the night before. They're only human and there's only so many of them. They were considerate and tried to get us out ASAP AND the nurse who walked us out made sure she took a family photo for us out front with the hospital name- something even we hadn't thought of.
Thumbs up, I'd do it again without changing anything.