Picking a Pediatrician?

Celry · #1 May 28th, 2009, 11:57 AM

How did you pick a pediatrician? Did you have an interview with him/her? If so, what questions did you ask?

I feel like I need to get this figured out soon in case I get put on bed rest.

KCMomma · #2 May 28th, 2009, 12:24 PM

Well, I was confused about this also. And I didn't know what type of questions to ask if I were to do an interview so I just went off of recommendations from my family and friends and that's how we chose. Good luck!

NortheastWifey · #3 May 28th, 2009, 12:41 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by GMerino

Well, I was confused about this also. And I didn't know what type of questions to ask if I were to do an interview so I just went off of recommendations from my family and friends and that's how we chose. Good luck!

Ditto. If we end up not liking the one we chose (although I've heard very good things about her) then we'll do interviews and switch around at that point. I do know people who did interviews before hand, though, so I think it's just up to what you personally want to do.

LuvMyToriBug · #4 May 28th, 2009, 01:06 PM

I actually went off of recommendations also, but ended up not liking the pedi group that was recommended. I liked the pedi but not the clinic. I ended up waiting for like 4 hours to get a weight check due to jaundice when Tori was only a week old. I was soooo frustrated. I did switch at that point. Usually the best way to chose is by word of mouth though, so, I would start with that. Ask friends, family, coworkers, etc. You actually may want to have a consultation and discuss things like vaxes, well baby checks etc. I would probably make sure that the chosen pedi is taking new babies, sometimes you run into the situation that the pedi may not be accepting new patients.

Celry · #5 May 28th, 2009, 04:35 PM

Thanks. I did talk to one person already. I really liked her. One of the key things for me was that she said she's willing to see anyone who decides not to vaccinate. We plan on vaccinating, but I love her flexibility on that and a few other things. That makes me think she'll be willing to work with us on other topics as they come up.

Lauren S · #6 May 28th, 2009, 05:47 PM

I also went with recommendations. I chose the place we wanted (between home and work), but then chose the doctor based on what others said.

courtneytcu98 · #7 May 28th, 2009, 07:53 PM

I asked a ton of people and it turned out the one that we went with initially was the on-call pedi who did Ell's circumcision. It wasn't a match, so the pedi we see now was recommended by the LC that I saw. My OB recommended a pedi group that I kept calling and couldn't actually talk to a real person, so I decided that it was not a good match for us!

SassyMama · #8 May 28th, 2009, 08:23 PM

Word of mouth as well as recommendations from the nurses at the hospital. She's supposedly one of the best in my area, yet I can't stand them for their unprofessionalism which leads me to wonder... How bad can worst-rated pedi's in my area possibly be?

Lo_and_Behold · #9 May 28th, 2009, 10:05 PM

I asked my OB for recommendations. I printed a directory of local pedi's from my insurance's website & brought that list w/me to one of my prenatal appts. The dr went over the list & checked the names he recommended. We met with one or two & weren't impressed. Because I saw 3 different OBs in the same practice, I went over the same list w/one of the other dr's. We went w/one of the pedi's she recommended. We also interviewed a pedi who worked at the same hosp as my husband.

You should be able to Google pediatrician interview questions (i.e. what are their views on vaccinations, what is the protocol for after hours, do they respond to questions via email, etc). I had printed a list of questions, but I don't remember where I found it online.

Good luck! It's a tedious process, but hopefully you'll get lucky & feel comfortable w/the first one you meet. Just remember that they're there for you & your baby, not the other way around. Just disregard anyone you don't feel 100% comfortable with even if someone else recommends them. It's your baby & that's #1 priority.

samspain · #10 June 4th, 2009, 04:19 AM

I just see the paediatrician in our village practice. Luckily he�s really nice, amd seems open to the parents opinions. I could choose a different Dr, but it would mean changing villages or even into the next town.

BabyBird · #11 June 4th, 2009, 06:53 AM

We are meeting with my sister's pedi next week. My sister loves her and she is picky so I trust her. If for some reason we don't like her I have a few others in mind that I will make interview appts for. I already called two others to make appts but they got scratched off the list immediately just by the way the phone call was handled. One girl was so confused as to why I wanted an appt before my baby was born and said she would put me on hold and ask a nurse and ended up cutting me off...buh bye! The other one sounded annoyed that I wanted an interview appt and transfered me to the drs voicemail instead of scheduling an appt so I hung up. You can tell a lot just by the phone call...what happens if you have a sick baby and need to talk to someone or get in for an appt that day and you get hung up on!

lttle_one · #12 June 5th, 2009, 08:23 AM

I asked around, specifically looking for a doc that was very pro-breastfeeding (they all claim to be, but the majority push formula when it's not necessary, and I wasn't going to deal with that), and would be accepting of the fact that we aren't vaxing on schedule and will probably not get a couple of the vaccines. I love our pediatrician and I'm so glad I didn't just pick one out of the phone book or go to the most popular pedi office in town.