First Maternity Tour
After confirming that I'm pregnant, we wondered what we should do next. 🤔
Spent the weekend reading about giving birth in Singapore, we found that almost everyone delivers in a hospital (not birth centers by midwives or home birth), and that we needed to look for a gynecologist/obstetrician. The challenge was that the majority of the O&G work in hospitals, and it seems that they mostly only deliver in the hospital they work at...
With that knowledge, we thought we should first choose a hospital. All the hospitals have maternity tours, but Raffles Hospital was the only one (based on what we found out) that didn't require appointments in advance. Here's the link to the maternity tours info on its website: https://www.rafflesmedicalgroup.com/hospital/patients-visitors/maternity/planning-for-a-baby
So, we went there on the following Saturday and joined the tour. The other expecting moms were in their third trimester...and I was less than 5 weeks 😂 The midwife conducting the tour asked if we were very excited about the pregnancy 😆
The tour turned out to be quite informative. It started off by the midwife introducing the hospital briefly and telling us the admission process. After that we went to see the delivery suite and facilities inside. It's more spacious and well equipped than I imagined.
Next, we moved on to see the maternity wards. There are different room types - shared room, single room, deluxe room and suite. Looked like hotel rooms if not for the medical equipments.
We also saw the nursery and were told about the neonatal ICU and operation theater. During the tour, the other couples asked questions that I didn't really understand...As beginners, we realized there's a lot to learn 🤓
After the tour, we both thought it would be good to deliver in that hospital. We asked the midwife for recommendations of O&G working there.
At the same time, we wanted to keep our minds open so we also made appointments for maternity tours at the other hospitals in Singapore...but they were 2-3 months away.
While taking maternity tours is not compulsory, we found it helpful to see the delivery suite, wards and nursery for ourselves, and to hear what others had to ask. It's a great learning experience.
You may also be interested in these articles:
- First Prenatal Check-up
- Pregnancy Related Reaources (book, websites, app, class…)
- From Delivery to Going Home
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