Dr Wendy Teo @ Mount Elizabeth Novena (highly recommended)

ayangle

New Member
I'm not a mummy but I'm a first-time super-duper-anxious hubby and now a happy daddy. Our gynae is Dr Wendy Teo from Wendy Women's Clinic, located on level 8 at Mount Elizabeth Novena Hospital.

This is my first post here in this forum, and pardon me if I break any rule or violate any regulation but I really feel an urge to write a review-cum-thankyou to our gynae who saved our baby's life.

Sorry this is a long story...

My wife was overseas during 1st trimester, only during early 2nd trimester then we had time to do several hospital tours. We really liked Mount Elizabeth Novena (I will write a second review/post on that later), and being first-time mummy/daddy we really had zero experience, so after deciding on the hospital, we just walked into the lobby (like what you would do entering a hotel) and asked the hospital staff is there a gynae available at Mount Elizabeth Novena who we could see and who could later perform delivery at the same hospital - the concieage staff seems surprised (yes, we have 0 experience) and after some calls they told us we could walk-in to see Dr Wendy Teo from Wendy Women's Clinic on the 8th floor.

We only have 1 criteria for choosing a gynae: be a mummy herself who has gone through pregnancy, delivery and raising a baby. I believe there is something men like me just don't understand or could not feel - sometimes what my wife need is not just medicine prescriptions and ultrasound scans, I think she needs assurance, especially from someone who has gone through this painful/stressful/happy/anxious/confused/tired/joyful journey. And a male gynae just can't provide that.

After the first session with her, my wife feels very comfortable. She is a nice doctor - who always smiles, quite different from a typical doctor one would see from a polyclinic (typical doctor-patient conversation/relationship). So we immediately decided to sign up for a package (it's about 1.2K, covers all consultation fees up to delivery). Well, we actually only did some search online after signing up - her fees seem to be in the "premium" range but definitely reasonable: I guess office rental at ME Novena isn't cheap and the "comfort" factor my wife feels with her is really important.

The following few sessions we learnt a few tips: always be on time - then we could see doctor in just a few minutes; if due to any reason we will be very late - better call the clinic because doctor may be at hospital side doing delivery; drink plenty of water on the way to the clinic and hold it - because for every visit the first thing is to do a urine test...

Well my wife feels happy for every session to see our gynae. Everything is good - baby weight, umbilical cord position, baby heart beat, amount of water in the uterus, etc. I guess mood during pregnancy is very very important. Seeing Dr Wendy has this "distress" effect on my wife - which I think is really good. During every session we always ask a lot of questions (both of us are paranoid haha) and our doctor always take time to explain - making my wife feel very comfortable. One thing I really like about her is that she will always end her session with "is there anything else you'd like to ask?" and after we have exhausted all our questions she would always wish us "take care", and sometimes with motherly advices like "drink more water k", "eat a little bit more for your baby", "must eat vitamins ok" ...

Finally on 12 Sep (our EDD is 19 Sep) our big day came: the night before, Dr Wendy suggested that if we could wait till midnight we would save 1 day's charge by the hospital (ME Novena starts counting days from midnight, so admission by 10pm would mean we spent 1 day at the hospital which is only 2 hours)... provided my wife can withstand the pain. At morning 7:30am, the CTG monitor on my wife suddenly showed the fatal heart rate has dropped from 130+ to just 40+. There were a lot of nurses rushing into the delivery suite - my wife clearly sensed something was wrong - she felt dizzy and cold and why suddenly so many nurses (5 or 6 of them surrounding my wife and I)... Some nurses have raised their pitch and seems hurried, and oxygen mask was put on her. While holding the oxygen mask, a nurse said to her "deep breath. breath in.. out.. in.. out.." - a typical scene of some medical emergency, which made my wife feeling more nervous. It was a frightening 10 minute which seemed eternally long - many things happened but luckily our gynae Dr Wendy stayed exceptionally calm, and I must say she is really experienced and decisive - she was not happy seeing lots of fresh blood after my wife's water bag broke and she immediately asked nurses to prepare for emergency caesarean section. My wife was crying, partly for fear and partly for pain. Dr Wendy tried her best to comfort my wife and give her assurance that both baby and her will be ok. "Mummy wants the best for her baby, right?" - that seems to be working. I can't really recall the whole event. 20 minutes later our baby boy was born - healthy and strong. I'm especially happy with his APGAR score of 9 for 1-minute and a perfect 10 for 5-minute (I googled APGAR and people say higher score = healthy + possibly more intelligent, every daddy also hope and want the best for his baby, so pardon me for this). I followed a nurse to bring our newborn baby to the nursery, while my wife was still lying in the operating theatre. The emergency c-section surgery ended at 10am+, then I received a phone call from Dr Wendy from the operating theatre that my wife is ok and will be coming up to our ward room soon. During later in-hospital visits, I realised from her that my wife has "abruptio placentae" - a condition that the placenta falls off before baby is delivered, which is a very dangerous condition. When I wikipedia-ed: 23% of babies will die from it (resulting in stillbirth), and we are the lucky 27% with no complication to both mummy and the baby. I must say that our doctor is: (1) very experienced (2) very decisive which is VERY VERY important giving the situation changes drastically in a very short period of time (my wife was crying begging her to try normal delivery and I asked Dr Wendy is there a chance she could deliver our baby via natural birth and her answer is a firm but motherly voice of "No") (3) very calm and does her best to comfort my wife

I guess we were really lucky: we chose the right gynae.

And through our journey, we learnt a lot and we would like to share our view with other fellow mummy-to-be and daddy-to-be: choose a gynae who brings comfort and assurance on top of being professional, and it is really better to always see the same gynae and have her deliver the baby. "mummy wants the best for her baby, right?"
 
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b3iib3ii

New Member
Hi,

Can you share your total bill for the delivery charges and the stay in the Mt E Hospital?
I'm seeing Dr Wendy too, just wanted to know the size of bill.
 

Sarahmerah

New Member
That's an amazing story and beautiful review!! full of love and appreciation. Forget the bill size!!! you have a healthy baby and Wife. Congratz
 

Letsi

New Member
Just want to add on that my wife was seeing Doctor Wendy and she delivered naturally with induced labor last week after her waterbag broke middle of the night at wk39...
We had the same problem where the fetal heartbeat dropped from 140-150 range to 50-60 range couple of times.
First time, came the oxygen mask. Second time, nurse came in and say big problem! Luckily my wife's dilation reached 9.5cm and that was the most dramatic 15 minutes of my life in the delivery suite but Doctor Wendy was still very focused and calm throughout the excitment.
Using the kiwi vacuum, she managed to help my wife delivered our baby girl although our girl ended up with a bua lu ku that subsided after 3 days.

Total bill was 8.5 (doctor and anesthesiologist fee was a cool 4k; 3.5 & 0.5 respectively) Medisave covered around 3.5K so my out of pocket was 5K even with the oxygen mask and 1-day photo therapy as my girl had jaundice and had to stay back for 1 more day before discharge. Please note that my 2 days package was based on normal/assisted delivery with epidural prior to the fee increase that happened in late Feb.

Although her fees were slightly higher than expected but my girl was safely delivered and that's all that matters right? :)
 
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