New Hampshire Babies
WildcatPrincess
Your daughter is beautiful. Congratulations!
Do you know anything about the NICU at CMC? Do they transfer out more complicated issues and if so, where? I'm trying to decide between Elliot and CMC and it comes down to midwives vs NICU at this point.
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Re: WildcatPrincess
Wow, clearly I don't come here often. Thank you! I also went to the midwives at CMC. We did a tour of the special care nursery before it opened (perks of working there!) and it's really nice. I think they said they can keep babies born at, I believe, 26 weeks and up (I could be wrong). Any earlier gestation they send the mom to Elliot. The rooms are set up like a normal hospital room, Mom stays with baby, but with all the crazy medical equipment needed complete with isolettes. If Mom is discharged before baby they are private NICU rooms with pull out couches and there is a "parents room" with a shower, lockers, kitchen, etc. so you can still stay with baby.
It's not as high a level as Elliot, there are some cases they wouldn't be able to handle, but they do have what's necessary to stabilize baby before transport and they did say they can handle all of the most common complications. They transport to DHMC unless the parents argue it. I'm pretty sure it's Dartmouth employees that staff the place.
ETA: If the parents argue the transfer to DHMC they can transfer to Elliot. I think the point was, though, that in the case they couldn't handle an issue Dartmouth nursery is two steps above them where Elliot is only one....or something to that effect. Sorry I don't remember more exactly!
Hello,
All three of our boys went through the Elliot NICU so feel free to email me if you have any questions about it! Our first son was there for 15 days and our twins were there for 67 days. I delivered at the Elliot and never toured CMC so I can't give you a comparison but if you just want more info about the NICU experience I can give you that
Thanks. I'm probably going to go to Elliot for baby 2 whenever that is. My concern was that with Alex (at a different hospital I'm not able to go to for the next time), I had great midwife care throughout the pregnancy, and I believe it was because of my midwife that I didn't end up getting a D&C (or worse) after birth. She made the doctors wait a few more minutes to stop the bleeding I was having, and it worked.
However, Alex had breathing issues and the NICU in the hospital I delivered at wasn't able to handle it. They transferred her to Childrens in Boston. She was 4 days old before I got to see her. I've finally come to the decision that missing out on 4 days of life is much worse than not having the midwife experience.