January 27, 2004

The best and worst of Sydney maternity hospitals

The publication released each year by NSW Health, The New South Wales Mothers and Babies Report, always provides fascinating reading. Using standardised data collected by midwives for every birth in the State for the calendar years, the Report gives the birth outcomes for a multitude of variables. Births are analysed by location, parity, country of origin of the Mother, Region, type (caesarean, forceps, normal etc), drugs used, age of mother, pregnancy complication and a whole host of other variables. The babies’ outcomes are analysed by gestation, birth weight and perinatal outcomes.

There is a lot to digest and we are lucky that our State Department of Health puts this information in the public domain. The data is collated for all maternity units but only those with over 200 births per year are included in the tables. All the rest are collectively reported as “Other hospitals”under each regional heading. I am always keen to check out the hospitals individually and to see how they are doing.

Here are the best and worst of maternity hospitals in Sydney from the recently released report for 2002:

Best: Auburn District Hospital

Normal vaginal births 79.2%

Forceps 1.9%

Vacuum 1.7%

Elective caesarean 9.6%

Emergency caesarean 7.4%

Worst: Kareena Private Hospital (Caringbah)

Normal vaginal births 40%

Forceps 10.5%

Vacuum 8.5%

Elective caesarean 26.9%

Emergency caesarean 14.1%

round the teaching hospitals in Sydney, the normal birth rate varies quite a lot, so gaining confidence and experience with normal births will depending on where you are trained.

Royal North Shore Hospital 57.9%

Royal Prince Alfred Hospital 62.3%

Westmead 66.1%

Royal Hospital for Women 60.5%

St George Hospital 68.0%

The rates for use of drugs for pain in labour vary enormously. The lowest use of drugs for labour pain was Queanbeyan (near Canberra) where 34.6% of women needed no drugs for pain, and in the city, Auburn again did well, with 21.3% of women labouring drug free. You can guess which was the worst hospital - at Kareena Private, only 1.4% of women did not receive any drugs for labour pain!

It really pays to shop around. The main distinguishing characteristic of Kareena Private Hospital is that it is run by obstetricians for women with private health insurance. Auburn has a high percentage of women who were not born in Australia and it is located in a less affluent area of the city. Being poorer and not speaking the language too well can be an advantage when it comes to getting the best birth, it seems.

Posted by andrea at January 27, 2004 01:15 PM

Comments

Hi there,

just wondering if you can give me some advise. Im pregnant and trying to work out what hospital, if i should use an obstatrician, midwife, public or private hospital. I have private health cover but the gap seems to be anywhere between 5000.00 to 11000.00 which we cant afford. I would like to speak to someone for advise as i am not from sydney and not familiar with hospitals, its also my first baby. What do you suggest. Thanks and Regards Tania

Posted by: tania pearce on February 20, 2004 09:31 AM

Comments

i went to Nepean fro a public but they also have private.. they are wonderful.. all new suites and filtrated choice music.. they were so great.. im going there again this time.. my third

Posted by: Rebecca on March 20, 2004 11:45 AM