Emory Midtown

[3littlelambs]

How natural birth friendly is this hospital? Are the L&D nurses supportive of natural birth? What about rooming in and breastfeeding support? I may be delivering there with Dr. Tate. Trying to get some info as I am unable to deliver at AMC or North Fulton. TIA!

[thorn]

it really depends on the individual nurse, some are awesome, some... not so much.

two questions - are you a vbac? and will you be bringing a doula with you?

[3littlelambs]

No, just a regular vaginal birth with #3. I am considering a doula.

[thorn]

they should be fine then. some of the nurses are a little more uptight about vbacs (monitoring, etc)

I'd definitely recommend having a doula (I think everyone should have a doula though )

when you are in triage you can request a nurse that enjoys working with natural birthers, or something along those lines.

[SublimeBirthGirl]

The hospitals are all uptight about VBAC. It's very annoying! I attended 2 births at Emory when I was doula-ing. The first time the nurses were apathetic. They weren't supportive in a showy way but they did absolutely nothing to be discouraging either. They pretty much left the mom alone and let us do our own thing. That was 38 hours with ROM too (she was with the Emory midwives back in the day).

My 2nd birth was a VBAC and I had some moments of extreme annoyance with the nurses (and Dr. Tate, honestly, though I do like him, & I understood where he was coming from despite my annoyance), but it was all VBAC-related stuff. As far as natural birth goes, they seemed very supportive and I know Dr. Tate is.

If I were to have a hospital birth again, the only thing that would keep Emory from being my first choice (from all my experiences at various hospitals including my own birth at N Fulton) is the lack of water birth as an option.

[kbuglove]

I delivered with Dr. Tate at 34 weeks and had to stay there at NICU for almost a month.

I was planning a homebirth so I was not enjoying being in a hospital, but Emory was actually quite great.

Nursing staff barely came in my room during my labor. Allowed me to only have to get monitored 5-10 minutes on the hour and did it while I was on birth ball or standing. I never even got on the bed except to deliver placenta. Delivered baby standing. Lactation consultants are very good there, and the lactation room is right next to the postpartum rooms.

I would say a majority of nursing staff is natural birth friendly. I met a bunch while in the antepartum unit on bed rest for a week. I never had to really fight for anything. I was very much respected.

Dr. Tate will not let the nursing staff do anything to his patients without him first approving. The nurses all spoke up to that.

[folkgirl]

Both my kids were born at Emory. My first was with the big OB group there, a failed induction, and my second was a VBAC with Dr. T. It's true that you never know who you'll get--but with my second birth I had much more relaxed nurses and they seemed more familiar with normal birth. L&D was not bad at all and I didn't feel like I had to do any fighting. Having a doula helped. Stark contrast from my first birth where the entire thing was an uphill battle that I eventually lost.