Piyavate Or Bumrungrad?

[bangkok4life]

Hi

My wife is going to be giving birth to our first child towards the end of January.

She is now 23 weeks pregnant.

Shes is already been going to Piyavate hospital Bangkok for the last 5 months for her monthly check ups.

So far all is going well, her doc is an older male and so far he seems to be good. We also have gotten good service from this hospital.

Her monthly check ups incl some meds and a 4d scan cost around 2200 baht a month.

He says the cost for the delivery of the baby will be around 45000 baht for normal birth.

I found out the cost at Bumrungrad and its the same and i have been told its a much better hospital, is this true?

Is it advisable to move my wife at this stage of her pregnancy to Bumrungrad?

Please advise.

[MikeyIdea]

There's nothing wrong with Piyavate, good hospital. So is Bumrungrad

I personally think it is unnecessary to change hospital at this stage, what for? Piyavate will do a good job

Unless Piyavate is an hour away from home and Bumrungrad is less than half an hour

[kannon99]

"Normal deliveries" at Piyavate don't happen.

I urge you to go down on a little tour of the labor and delivery ward and have a little private chat with the nurses on duty. Ask them how many vaginal births they see a month. That should be an eye opener to what it's really like there.

A client of mine intending to birth there did just that and the nurse told her "pretty much 0 percent vaginal birth". You won't get the truth like that from a doctor or the hospital admin.

The World Health Organization says that hospital C-section rates should be 10-15% MAX. And even that high of a number is debatable. That puts Piyavate at let's say 99%. Bumrungrad isn't much better. Overall, it's around 90%. If you're Western and birthing there, it's still 60%.

[MikeyIdea]

I question those percentages - 99% at Piyavate and 90% at Bumrungrad? To me that sounds like the farang myth

[kannon99]

It's not a farang myth at all. It's coming from someone living in Thailand who has been working extensively in the birthing field for a long time, including at both of these hospitals.

[MikeyIdea]

It's not a farang myth at all. It's coming from someone living in Thailand who has been working extensively in the birthing field for a long time, including at both of these hospitals.

I agree that the natural birth rate is lower in Thailand than in the Western world and also that it is lower at private hospitals than government ones. Exactly the same trend as in America and when comparing America with Europe

But I still do not believe the percentages you give, I still think they are a myth

[thaiclan]

I do agree the % seems high and it got me thinking. I gave birth in the UK and my local NHS hospitals were ALL over 45% so I know that figure for sure. So in regards to 90% I thought that was too high until I started thinking of the people I know who have actually birthed in Thailand. Although not an accurate indication I do know of 13 births and actually only 2 were natural delivery! Maybe there is something to those % after all.

Although these were all in Pattaya and I think Bangkok Pattaya probably has the worst reputation for unnecessary intervention across the board.

One of my friends was told she needed a C-section and then conveniently they could remove her appendix at the same time for the special price of just 20k. Her British husband asked if there was a problem with her appendix..."no but can do same time :-)". Only in Thailand! LOL

[MikeyIdea]

I have been working for a big multi-national in Bangkok since 1996, we're a big office and I have heard of dozens of births throughout the years, more than a dozen of them were people I personally work with and know

Office women do strangely enough have less natural births than the generally poorer non-office girls. The percentage of c-sections at the office is over 50%, I don't know the exact figure but slightly less than or around 60% feels about right

The more experienced office women normally recommend natural birth and the younger less experienced normally want c-section because they think it hurts less. Many of the office girls that at the end of the day do a c-section want it themselves, or are at least very easy to convince. That is in my opinion a big factor. The hospitals don't control these women saying that they must have a c-section, the doctor merely suggests and they have already answered yes before he even has finished the sentence, because they are unsecure and afraid...

Does it exist that doctors totally unnecessarily want women to have c-sections? Yes, I am sure it does but it is not the whole story

[aussiebebe]

I do agree the % seems high and it got me thinking. I gave birth in the UK and my local NHS hospitals were ALL over 45% so I know that figure for sure. So in regards to 90% I thought that was too high until I started thinking of the people I know who have actually birthed in Thailand. Although not an accurate indication I do know of 13 births and actually only 2 were natural delivery! Maybe there is something to those % after all.

Although these were all in Pattaya and I think Bangkok Pattaya probably has the worst reputation for unnecessary intervention across the board.

One of my friends was told she needed a C-section and then conveniently they could remove her appendix at the same time for the special price of just 20k. Her British husband asked if there was a problem with her appendix..."no but can do same time :-)". Only in Thailand! LOL

That's really funny about the C-section/appendix promotion. I read another thread about the costs of having an appendix removed and wondered to myself whether it might be prudent to just remove it to avoid any possibility of further complications. OMG I've been here too long - I'm thinking like a Thai person.

[bkkjames]

When my mrs was giving birth, after a couple hours of labour, a c section was suggested.

While I have no complaints about the result, it does seem a pretty good income booster for the hospital.

[bkkjames]

Just to add a quote from my mrs-the nurse was in her ear about 'you should have a c section....it's easier, less painful etc'

The fine line is how to know in the middle of giving birth whether to question your dr.

[samran]

When my mrs was giving birth, after a couple hours of labour, a c section was suggested.

While I have no complaints about the result, it does seem a pretty good income booster for the hospital.

That seems to be the track record of westerners we've known who've had babies at Bamrungrad.

One of the reasons we went for Samitivej, and in particular our doctor (Dr Sankiat) who despite my wife's insistence for lots of drugs when the labour really kicked in, respected her original wish for a drug free natural birth.

[Boo]

One of the reasons we went for Samitivej, and in particular our doctor (Dr Sankiat) who despite my wife's insistence for lots of drugs when the labour really kicked in, respected her original wish for a drug free natural birth.

I'm sure she was trilled with that at the time.

[samran]

One of the reasons we went for Samitivej, and in particular our doctor (Dr Sankiat) who despite my wife's insistence for lots of drugs when the labour really kicked in, respected her original wish for a drug free natural birth.

I'm sure she was trilled with that at the time.

Well you have to make the call in advance and trust the doctor's professional experience on this. My wife did forgive him, and we came back for a second time around for no.2.

He is really good and lots of people flock to him as we won't pull the 'oh, 3 hours of labour? I suggest we do a c-section (so I can get home and put the kids to bed).

He was there all night with us from 12am to 6am when our first daughter was born rushing between us and next door where one of our friends was also having her son at the same time as ours.

Same again for no.2.

[bkkjames]

For the record we didn't have our son at any of the above mentioned hospitals.

[smokie36]

I gave birth in the UK and my local NHS hospitals were ALL over 45% so I know that figure for sure.

I've been working in the NHS for 20 years and attended many Caesarean Sections....when I started the figures were generally around 10-12%.....the rise in women demandng deliveries this way combined with a more cautious approach has led to many maternity units reporting rates of 15-20% or slightly more.

I don't know where this figure of 45% is coming from. We'd never get any sleep if it were true!

[MikeyIdea]

Office women do strangely enough have less natural births than the generally poorer non-office girls. The percentage of c-sections at the office is over 50%, I don't know the exact figure but slightly less than or around 60% feels about right

Been thinking about the 60% figure that I gave, a little bit more than 50% sounds more correct.

More than 50 but not much

[thaiclan]

I gave birth in the UK and my local NHS hospitals were ALL over 45% so I know that figure for sure.

I've been working in the NHS for 20 years and attended many Caesarean Sections....when I started the figures were generally around 10-12%.....the rise in women demandng deliveries this way combined with a more cautious approach has led to many maternity units reporting rates of 15-20% or slightly more.

I don't know where this figure of 45% is coming from. We'd never get any sleep if it were true!

@ Smokie - heres a good link for a chart breakdown of hospital births across the UK. My link

My local hospital was in London and it seems London and the South have the highest c-section rates.

[smokie36]

I gave birth in the UK and my local NHS hospitals were ALL over 45% so I know that figure for sure.

I've been working in the NHS for 20 years and attended many Caesarean Sections....when I started the figures were generally around 10-12%.....the rise in women demandng deliveries this way combined with a more cautious approach has led to many maternity units reporting rates of 15-20% or slightly more.

I don't know where this figure of 45% is coming from. We'd never get any sleep if it were true!

@ Smokie - heres a good link for a chart breakdown of hospital births across the UK. My link

My local hospital was in London and it seems London and the South have the highest c-section rates.

Thanks for that link. Interesting to see just how high the rates are becoming....glad I've given up doing on call work!

[fletchsmile]

Had 2 at Bumrungrad. Extremely happy and would never dream of going anywhere else.

Dr. Noppadol Sarapola. Excellent - UK trained. Normal birth, never any suggestion of anything else.

[LazyCat]

Had 2 at Bumrungrad. Extremely happy and would never dream of going anywhere else.

Dr. Noppadol Sarapola. Excellent - UK trained. Normal birth, never any suggestion of anything else.

YEP! me too 2 with Dr. Noppadol HE IS THE BEST... I also went to Samitivej to Dr. Sankiat - did not like the hospital , or "I-know-it-all" doctor or the fact they could not calculate the cost for the delivery...

In Bamgrungrad Dr. Noppadol is the best , attentive, will never say that he knows better what you need ( even though he does! ) very gentle on giving an advice, I had 1 normal, pills free delivery and another one.. was difficult and we had to end up with unplanned c-section, but we( and the doctor who was with me all the time since 3am! till 10-30 ) tried our best...

I do not blame my doctor for с-section it was my son who was wrapped twice in his umbilical cord and could not come out by himself.. I highly recommend Dr. Noppadol and I wish people like him could be replicated