the hospital

several people have asked about having a baby in hungary so before i forget i'd better make a record of it. these are the differences i experienced between having reese at memorial hermann hospital in houston, texas and matson at telki hospital in telki, hungary.



1. this is telki hospital which is located seven kilometers outside budapest. so technically matson was born in telki, hungary, not budapest. it is a very quiet, peaceful place. i was the only delivery on saturday, june 28, 2008 and there were no other deliveries during our two night stay - very different from the approximate 96 maternity ward rooms that were full while we were at memorial hermann with reese.


2. i didn't have an IV during labor, delivery or afterwards. can we say all natural?!


3. the midwife, who was with me during labor and who actually delivered the baby while the doctor stepped off to the side (strange, i know. i'm not sure what the deal with this was), told me to each chocolate during labor. not sure what the sweetness/sugar does, but i took her up on it and ate some peanut m&ms! :)


4. i didn't get a hospital bracelet, but matson did (about 2 hours after he was born). there was no security chip in the bracelet like reese had at memorial hermann. no checking the mother's bracelet with the baby's bracelet. we kept matson in our room the entire time we were there, so there really wasn't a need to check the bracelet.


5. at memorial hermann there was a strict policy about the baby leaving the room. reese had to be in the bassinet, not held. at telki, the pediatrician visit was in another room so the nurse would come in to get matson and just walk down the hall with him. we, of course, went with him.


6. the rooms were like a hotel room - two single beds, two bedside tables, a table with two chairs, a closet, a bathroom (with shower only), a tv and a thermostat to control your own air. nice! i spent labor and delivery in another room and then moved to this room. no big patient bed or small chair for matt to sleep in. this room was by far much better than the one at memorial hermann.


6. no middle of the night interruptions. it's quite surprising just how much less the nurses come in your room. i only had my blood pressure and temperature taken twice a day and not at all during the night! i remember at memorial hermann the nurses coming it at all hours of the night.


7. we stayed two nights at the hospital which is the same as we did with reese, but we left a lot earlier than most hungarians. for a normal delivery in hungary without any complications the typical stay is 3-4 nights. for a cesarean section the typical stay is 7 days! yes, 7 days! and, it's not uncommon for hungarian women to check into the hospital early and wait for the baby to come. can you imagine?! no way.


8. checking out was interesting. the administrative lady came to visit us to get all the information for matson's birth certificate (which looks really cool, by the way) so we gave her all the pertinent information which included our passports and an officially translated copy of our marriage certificate by the hungarian government. after she came back with copies of everything and we were cleared by the obstetrician and pediatrician, we were free to leave. matt and i packed up our stuff, put matson in the carseat and walked out. matt carried the bags and i carried matson. there was no wheelchair escort out or anything like that. we even walked down the stairs b/c the elevator was taking too long! ha! we had to stop at the front desk to check out and pay before we left. yes, we paid the bill before leaving. (not to worry our insurance will pay us back 80% of it, but the whole stay only cost $3,200 which included delivery, meals, pediatrician, etc.) after checkout we called a taxi to come get us. i think it's funny that matson's first car ride was in a taxi. not many people can say that.


this is my hungarian doctor - dr. árpád kosztin.


overall our hospital experience in telki was good. since this was our second baby, we felt a bit more at ease with caring for a newborn. we weren't the typical first time parents jumping at every little squeak or grunt from our little guy. it was much smoother the second time around which, i think, made our stay at the hospital a little easier. actually, we sort of got bored since matson was sleeping the whole time. the television didn't work the first day and even after we got it working, there was only like one channel in english - the news of course. we had our computer so we were able to connect to the world. we had several friends come by to visit and we even had some visitors from the USA...

if you look closely you can see matt's dad on the screen. skype is such a beautiful thing! it felt really good to be able to share matson with our parents the day he was born even when they were on the other side of the world!