With my daughter I had all my care under a Sanitas gynocologist. This involved monthly scans and all the usual blood tests and monthly checks. I had his phone number in case of an emergency and gave birth in a private hospital where I had my own very nice 'hotel' room!
This time round with twins I have opted for both private and state care. I started off going down the private route and then at 15 weeks my dr recommended that I register under the state system. The main reason for this is that as my pregnancy is now classed as high risk ( age, twins, dodgy cervix ) I will have to have my babies in the best hospital equiped for a high risk pregnancy. The privates don't in general have premature baby units and so the best place to have my babies is one of the state hospitals. In my case either the Costa del Sol or the Materno. ( In Marbella and Malaga respectively ) I'm happy with this, I want to have my babies in the place best equiped to care for them and me and didn't particularly enjoy my private hospital birth, although the cushy private room was a big bonus!!!
Now in Spain you can have private treatment throughout your pregnancy and then turn up a state hosptial for the birth with a folder of your notes. A lot of people do this and you don't need to have visited the hospital before turning up for the birth. Or alternatively at some point in your pregnancy you can register with the state system and receive your scans and care from the State as well as privately.
This is what I am now doing at 16 weeks. The bonus is that when you turn up at the state hospital for the birth they will have all your details in the computor and be aware of anything that needs special attention. Also with high risk pregnancies they may want to call you in more at the end and organise your birth for you, so it's important that if you are high risk that you are under the State as well as your private doctor.
Yesterday I had my first matrona ( midwife ) appointment and it was great. The matrona was really nice, quite young, spoke perfect English and amazingly the appointment was bang on time!! ( Don't often get that at my private clinic!! )
She took a really detailed gyno history and asked all about my daughter's birth and the ivf. So now I have my little Salud Embarazado book with all my notes in it. I have to go back tommorrow at 8am to do the diabetes drink and urine test. Then in March I have an appointment to see the pregnancy dr who will listen to the heartbeats and do some other checks and also that week I have an appointment with the scanning center to come in for their 20 week scan. So all in all I thought it was very thorough. If I was only going public I'd feel I was getting a good service although I guess it's luck of the draw as to who you see and the time of the appointment.
The matrona said a lot of people these days go private and public and it's a good idea.
Comparing the public and private systems is quite interesting .... here's what I've discovered so far!
* Appointment times - you can book your private appointments at times that are suitable to you and convienient. With the state system it seems to be a case of take what you are given and don't ask if you can change it!!
* Scans ... privately you have a scan every month and more if you need them. The State system offers a 12 week scan and then a 20 week scan ... not sure yet what happens after that! I do know that friends who have had 'problems' have been called in for extra scans on the state for eg at 16 weeks ...
* Quality of care .... going by my matrona appointment which was incrediably thorough, at this stage I can only say that the quality of care seems to be equal
* Hospitals ... in the private hospitals you can enjoy a nice cosy private room with your baby, in the state hospitals expect to share with at least one other person and their baby too!
More as I find it out .....................
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