1st Plunket visit

is tomorrow...so what should i expect or ask of them?

It has taken ages for them to contact me and when they finally did they made coming for a visit sound such a chore for them...OMG!!! SO i decided to make them come...

so what should i ask for to make most of it? I hope they will weigh, measure etc, and for sure going to ask about the breath thing she has been doing (freaks me out), but i imagine from their awful attitude that this will be only visit....soooo how to make most of it - idas???

The nurse should weigh and meisure baby and generally check you are coping and handling baby ok with feeding etc.

My first visit was such a shock as my midwife had been all for demand feeding/bed sharing, the nurse turned up and asked why my bubba wasn't in a cot and told me "no baby had died from crying" when I said i didn't like to leave him!

After she left I had a huge cry. So be prepared some of the nurses are awesome but some are very old fashioned and stuck in their ways.

If you don't get on you don't have to see her though, the choice is yours. Good luck

The weird questions I guess is to have red flags for domestic violence. They also asked me if we own our own home, which i found a bit weird, so I asked why, and she said lots of people who rent move on and leave no forwarding or contact details? Our plunket here is awesome, and I've got the same plunket nurse I have had since Jacob was about 15 months (our old one left to work at hospice and wound up looking after my dad, small world..) She is really nice (about my age) BUT I don't think she has any children of her own?

DEFINATELY ask her about the breath thing, and anything else you wonder about. I must admit, I do sometimes take their advice with a grain of salt, I still ring my m/w if I want to know something, as plunket can be quite rigid about things, more of "most babies like.." instead of "some babies or your baby like..."

Edited by fattartsrock

BS thats so bad that they have made you feel that way! My plunket nurse is lovely - although my SIL said hers was just horrible and in the end she ditched them and just went through her GP as her Well child provider. So I guess in the end its just luck of the draw.

When mine came for the 1st time she weighed and measured Elle and checked all her reflexes. Read through her Well child book, and asked lots of questions - I got the do you own your own home one too Fattartsrock, but not the DV one ( i did have a friend here though so maybe would've asked had she not been here), I probably would've been gob-smacked if she had've asked me that.

Hope she's a bit nicer when you meet her.

I'm just pleased she's finally coming BS - what a performance! And you are entitled to two home visits before 12 weeks so make sure they come back, even if it's just to weigh etc. - they get paid for it!

I got the whole domestic violence thing too, my midwife was great, she met Willie and could see that he is just a giant teddy bear, but the visiting Plunket nurse saw a photo on the wall and got all worried. Oh, and then she told me I should make him get a vasectomy - WTF???? So now I take the gremlins back to see the Plunket nurse I had with Maya who actally has half a clue.

that sucks BS, mine was so good. Didn't measure him, but weighed and measured head, did a check up of him and went through all the questions. Told me all the courses plunket can offer and the groups they organise as well (walking and the like), think I got the luck of the draw though as I do know others have had bad experience.

You remember me complaining about my first visit to them. I must admit when i went to the Pakuranga one that I got hubby to come with me to give them hell if they start with me on this child again.

Was a total different experience. Everything that was wrong last time was great this time. Was extremely happy about her weight and her milestones ect and really happy that I was still BFding. (hubby was making himself ready specially for that one. )

It seems it totally depends on who you get ect. So just going to try and go with the same one every time.

such a shame we have such a good plunket nurse with both mine must be the small town thing maybe

That's such a shame BS, I hope your next Plunket appointment goes better, perhaps with someone different? Or that the office gets their act together very quickly!
I too was very skeptical about Plunket after hearing a few bad stories from other people, but I have to say that our Plunket nurse is fabulous.
We got the two home visits, she always makes sure I know I can book a Karitane nurse visit in between the Plunket ones (it's a long time between the 5 month and 9 month visits!) and in Hamilton we can go into the main office and weigh our bubs ourselves on their scales, which I've found useful.
We see the same nurse every time and she is always on time and very helpful, asks good questions and picks up on things we are having trouble with, always happy to talk about even the smallest of things and either sympathise or suggest different methods. She is around my age and has two kids.
What really sold me was when I went in to the main Plunket office last week to weigh DD and ask about a solids course, and my Plunket nurse happened to be there seeing someone else. She overheard me mention to the receptionist that I've been having some trouble with DD sleeping and the next day I got a phone call from her at home to check and make sure eveything was ok and that we were coping, and suggest a few things. So brilliant and just made me feel a million times better.
So a big to Hamilton Plunket. Nearly every time I've dealt with them I've come away happy.
That said, I've heard other people haven't been so happy, but they are in different suburbs so it really is dependent on who you deal with.

I've had a good experience with Plunket too - I think a lot iof it depends on who you get as your visitor.  Mine's great, pretty down-to-earth and seems to really know her stuff, and she still comes to my house which is nice for me.  I go into the local Family Centre to get Ella checked every fortnight too because of her health, and they're lovely in there - very friendly and accomodating.  The one caution I do have about Plunket is that they're 'supposed' to tell you certain things depending on what their current campaigns are - breast is best, back to sleep, always change on the floor... well be realistic, my changetable is much easier, some people's babies refuse to sleep on their backs, and for some people, breastfeeding isn't best at all.  That annoys me, that some of the info they give you is a bit idealistic - sure those campaigns are all for good reason, but there's always exceptions and it's really hard to get info on, say, babies who insist on rolling to sleep, or formula feeding safely. 

If you have a plunket nurse who you're not happy with, can you change your WellChild provider to Karitane, or someone else?  Might be worth thinking about for those with bad experiences of it all.