Having A Baby At Chumphon Hospital

[4evermaat]

I was supposed to submit this months ago, but it didn't work out that way. So I will see how much I can recall from my memories.

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Gf started complaining that she hurt in the stomach area, but wasn't sure if she was pregnant. It wasn't until about 2-3 weeks later we got a test to verify the pregnancy. Turns out she was already pregnant for like 7 weeks or so.

Pre-natal care: If the thai national who is pregnant wishes to opt for the free healthcare option, she has to be registered on a local or provincial house registration in Chumphon (tambien baan) to get the free care. I understand that this is also true for how healthcare works in thailand (have to be registered in the same-province tambien baan for non-immediate medial care. Is this true?)

The first visit, the mother gets a booklet that documents the progress of the pre-natal and post-birth care. Either that same visit or the next visit, there is an ultrasound of the baby to determine the sex (optional) and the doctor gives an estimation on the birthday. It turns out that the doctor's estimation was only 1 week off

Every 4-6 weeks, the mother goes into the hospital for some kind of counseling and/or check from the doctor. It appears to be a group thing, in that many mothers seem to do this at designated times.

There is a group counseling session early on where they want the father to go. It's all in Thai, but the doctor basically welcomes you to parenthood.

There is no real baby shower here in Thailand. And no buying of too much stuff ahead of time. You just start picking up a few basics here and there; mainly cloth diapers, and a couple of small shirts, maybe a small crib. Most of the shopping takes place shortly after the baby is born. Gf's mother does come for a few months to help with the newborn.

Supposedly, I was supposed to have 4,000 baht prepared to pay a doctor to ensure special care was taken care of gf. But the doc never showed the night of the birth, and so that money went to the room. I'm honestly not sure what the difference would have been; even our friend who used to work at the hospital could not confirm that it would have made a difference. i guess i will never know

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Birthday: Gf complains of pain in womb area. She was given a ride in town and it turned out to be a false alarm. But the following week, it hurts a bit more, and the ambulance was called at night to bring her to the hospital. The neighbor went on separate motorbike. I followed about 2 hours later.

Things to bring for the baby: Passport for you, mother's thai id card if she doesn't already have it;

- cell phones AND chargers.

- cloth diapers (won't accept pamper diapers); people usually bring a 'kit' or small plastic carry cage with loads of them.

- 2 rolls minimum of paper towels (the big-C or Tesco store brand or the blue/yellow logo brand is best....avoid the 'extra soft' Scott or other soft paper towels),

- baby wipes (big C has the cheapest regular priced options.89 baht for 80 sheets, resealable)

- baby soap (they have the kit with all the soaps or soap/cloth diaper for 299 or so @ Big C, but only the body wash is good enough; the kit makes a great gift)

- clothes hanger with clothes pins (can buy at the 'everything is 20 baht' shops for 20-40 baht). You can wash on site, or in my case bring them home and wash yourself. There are a couple of coin laundry places nearby, but I don't think they are adjacent to the hospital. You have to go around towards Ocean Mall or the technical college (tech-nik).

- a couple of shirts (optional),

- 2-4 soft wash towels to wrap baby in,

maybe an empty baby bottle and hand breast pump if you have one (optional).

Most of this stuff will fit in that plastic cage i talked about earlier + a small carry bag.

For you/mother

- blanket / large towel

- wash soap

- bottled water

- flip flops / sandals

- laptop / internet

The hospital will sell you a limited quantity of a few of these things at reasonable prices, but best to bring yourself. There is a 7-11 right across the street from hospital, plus a couple of baby shops 300 meters away, and Ocean mall, tesco expresses, more 7-11s, and baby shops within a 3Km radius of hospital. You'll be fine.

The babies are born downstairs in the delivery room. Everyone (including the father) must wait outside in the wait area until the mother and baby are brought outside. WAIT patiently....she will eventually come out with your newborn. It is a good idea to have your cell phone (and the mother has hers) and she can possibly call for a second or two with an update. The baby was born Sunday night, but it took like 3+ hours for the mother and child to be released early Monday morning.

Now upstairs on the 4th floor is where the families and babies stay until released by the doctor, which is usually 1-3 days unless there are complications. My understanding is that you should actually go upstairs ahead of time (as soon as you go to the hospital) to be put on waiting list for private room; they fill up quickly. We didn't do this, but when we went upstairs, we were able to get the last room available....the only one without a gated balcony. But it has aircon, private fridge, and private bath, No hot water. 1,000 baht....it was still worth it if you can afford it.

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Post birth: Waking up to the sound of crying babies in the morning is something you will get used to for the next couple of days. The private room made it more bearable. The common area isn't really that bad....you do have a curtain for privacy. The morning routine of taking the temperature, bringing in the warm water for the baby to take a shower, bringing the mother food, and taking the baby for a walk is all a part of the experience. Everybody will want to know where you come from and where you stay.

The nurses are fairly attentive, but they have a de facto rule of having someone stay with the mother at night or to assist sometimes during the day. The common area had fathers or family sleeping on the floor or the large balcony next to the mother. In the private room, there is a mini bench for you to sleep, although i suppose you could bring a fold-able beach chair.

They do not have wifi on site, so you must bring your own internet. My by Cat / True - H are the only 3g options that I know (and Cat CDMA if you still have that). Perfect signal in the room.

They do lock down the 4th floor at night from the inside appx 10pm or so, for security reasons. And quiet hours begin around that time until the "baby hungry symphony" in the morning.

Gf had a vasectomy later on that day (Monday) and we stayed an extra day for any complications.

You just have to be a little easy when it comes to the standards. It's not poor, but look out for the occasional lazy nurse that wants to go back to talking instead of getting us the warm water that we need. Or trying to pour the water from yesterday into today's drinking water instead of giving us a new batch of water. Keep in mind my mother works as a nurse in the USA, so I have a pretty good idea of what kind of behavior is acceptable. Keep your cool, even when you are tempted to explode on something minor that TO YOU seems out of place. My gf intervened and politely asked for new water.

One other thing. If you do not want any vaccines, you must state this. In fact, it is better to be there to decline the vaccination. If that's important to you, something to consider.

There is a lady who works in the hospital, but sells some helpful items on the side. Like the waist pillow that wraps around the mother and can be used for breast feeding. Or the waist band which offers some back and waist support after the birth and especially the vasectomy procedure (300 baht or so for each).

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Checkout:

You actually do not need the baby's name prepared until you are ready to check out. If you want the baby covered under the free health care program, you and the father need to go down to the city hall "te-sah-baan" and obtain a thai birth certificate (behind the fire station, down the street from the technical college, but before the market/TMB bank/Choo-ka-nan city bus station). The birth certificate will have the thai national Id # that is needed to process the baby under the health care. I'm not sure if you need to bring the house registration with you to do this (a copy or the original).

Even with no one in line, expect to stay 20-30 minutes there making small talk, but also making sure that the father/foreigner's name is spelled correctly in thai. I had to pronounce my name about 30-50 times slowly, but they eventually got what is the best spelling possible with Thai symbols. I must commend the worker for taking the extra time to insist on this as she mentioned she did not want us to have any problems later on down the road.

Come back to the hospital, and then you take some paperwork from upstairs to a few different offices down on the first floor to get processed. The final stop is the billing / pharmacy counter, where you pick up any medication and pay for the room. We stayed a total of 2.5 nights, but they only billed us for 2 nights. Once you pay, they then congratulate you and give you a Mamy Poko mini bag with some sample diapers, baby wipes, etc

These offices close down around 4:30pm-ish, so if you don't want to be charged an extra day for the room, start getting everything ready no later than 2pm or so it isn't such a mad dash.

Go back upstairs, show them the paperwork, and then head home with the newborn.

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Special thanks to Ryan and Coo for helping us with the room, city hall paperwork, and giving the newborn a ride home.

[David48]

Warmly appreciate the story you shared ... I learnt some things ...

Hope everything goes well for you, your partner and your new-born.

[Mario2008]

Congratulations.

Healthcare covevrage depends on the scheme you are under. For most it is indeed only the hospital where yu are registered, with the exception of an emergency. In case of an emergency you can use any hospital. Civil servants can in an emergency even use private hospitals if there is no public hopsital nearby. Don't know about the rules for other schemes.

Children must be registred within 15 days of birth at the amphur and recieve a birth certificate.

The birth certificate is always in Thai, thus prepare the names in cluding your own in Thai. If you have a work permit or did get marreid in Thailand take those papers with you, so they can copy the names from there. That ensures that you use the same name with the Thai government everywhere.