welcome back everyone we are the doctors bjorkman a physician couple putting our medical
expertise to the test as we experience pregnancy for the first time ourselves
and this week we want to talk about something that's important to think about before baby comes
and that is choosing a pediatrician so stay tuned we are going to cover the key things to consider
when making this decision for your little baby so for anyone who hasn't met us yet i'm dr sarah
bjorkman i'm an ob gyn and i am also 20 weeks pregnant and i am her husband dr kirby ortman
i'm a board certified pediatrician and as we've been going week by week through pregnancy we
thought it'd be great to take this week to talk specifically about how to choose a pediatric
provider for your baby yeah so if you are anything like me which i'm guessing that you are if you are
watching this video you like to plan ahead and as it is the general recommendation is that it's best
to reach out to the person that's going to be the medical provider for your baby when mom is about
30 weeks pregnant or at the start of the third trimester so our hope is that by giving that
information this week it gives you lots of time to think about ask around and plan for making
that phone call at around 30 weeks so we are going to be talking about different types of pediatric
providers how to find the best pediatric provider in your area and then questions that you are going
to want to ask when you are making that decision as a soon-to-be mama i can honestly say that
i am more concerned about who is going to be my baby's doctor than figuring out who is going to be
my ob so to start this discussion let's talk about the different types of pediatric providers
that see kids and babies yeah so the options are pretty straightforward there are pediatricians
family doctors pediatric nurse practitioners or pediatric physician associates physician
assistants and depending on where you live those different options may be limited or not available
to you but we want you to be informed about what all the available options are so you can
make the best decision for your family so let's start by talking about what it takes to become
a board-certified pediatrician so these medical providers have done four years of medical school
and then after that have done at least three years of specialized medical residency in just
pediatrics where they specialize in everything from birth uh through adolescence and into the
early 20s these people during their training they spend time in newborn nurseries outpatient clinics
neonatal and pediatric icus inpatient hospital units and also the emergency department
then after they finish their residency training these pediatricians have to sit for a specialized
licensing exam by the american board of pediatrics to become board certified you can know your
pediatrician is board certified by looking for the letters f-a-a-p after their name or by using
the american board of pediatrics verification tool listed below if a pediatrician is not board
certified it could mean a couple of things the first is that they are just out of their residency
training and their board exam has not yet been finalized that's usually within the first six
months the second option is they have not passed the board certification exam and the third option
is they have lost that board for certification for some reason yeah and so if for whatever reason the
pediatrician you're planning to see is not board certified this might cause you to pause a little
bit you can always ask some questions about it and they can let you know more about kind of if they
are certified or not another group of doctors that care for babies and children are family doctors
this group of doctors also completes four years of medical school as well as three years of residency
and while they don't have as much of that residency time dedicated specifically to
pediatrics they have the benefit of caring for all ages of patients from birth until death really and
so one of the advantages there if you're seeing a family doctor is that they can see your kiddo from
birth through adulthood as well as potentially you and all of your other children and so that can be
a really wonderful relationship for families for decades to come other great options for pediatric
care providers are nurse practitioners or mps or pas which are physician assistants or physician
associates now for the sake and purpose of this discussion we're going to put these two
groups together even though they've got different training and different background so basically nps
or pas can either practice as part of a family medicine or pediatrics group where they're
supervised for by a physician or in some places they actually have the privileges in licensing
to practice independently so these providers have the ability to get extra subspecialty training for
care of pediatrics for pas these are called the ciq or a certification of added qualifications
for mps you want to make sure and look that they are a certified pediatric nurse practitioner i've
worked with many pediatric nurse practitioners and pas in the pediatric world and would be more
than happy to have either one of them uh be the primary care provider for our baby to be
definitely so how do you actually find a pediatric provider yeah so as it turns out
google actually isn't a bad place to start to look and see who provides pediatric care in your area
and as we talked about when you are looking for an ob for mom one of the easiest ways also is to
just ask around ask at work ask your friends ask your obs office and you can even look in
online forums or facebook groups in your area yeah and remember that the advice that you get
from these free sources is worth what you pay for it so please be sure to check their
certifications which you can all find online if you're having trouble finding certification at all
it is totally okay to ask a provider's office for it i would say one of the most common things that
our friends have asked kurt in terms of like pediatrician advice is actually who they should
go see for their pediatrician and that was much easier when we were in residency kurt worked with
and knew all the general pediatricians we were there for four years so he could really speak to
people's personalities and practice styles and kind of try to match make you know our friends
and who would be good for them to go see for their pediatrician but now that we are here
in fellowship in a new location we the playing field is leveled and we are here just like regular
parents trying to figure out who the heck we should go see for our pediatrician because we just
don't know people yet kurt works with pediatric cardiologists so not general pediatricians and
so i am doing what all of you are doing and asking friends people i work with who to go see and some
of the greatest advice i have gotten is actually from my ob gyn she's a mom she has four kids and
so she really has a lot of insider information on who the great pediatricians are in our area so
that's one to think about in addition to asking your girlfriends people you work with also ask
your ob gyn if they have any recommendations about a pediatrician for you to see so once you have
that list of certified pediatric providers in your area then comes a difficult task of whittling it
down and making that final choice so to help you do this we came up with a list of six questions to
ask so the first one is what type of group is it are there multiple providers am i going to see the
same provider every single time and while it is nice to get to see that same provider every time
know that if you have an urgent visit you might not be seeing that provider if you need to get
in the same day yeah um another really important question is what kind of office hours do they have
do they have night weekend appointments available and how hard is it to get a same-day appointment
number three is um what happens if you have a middle of the night concern is there a nurse
or doctor line you can call and then what kind of fees are associated with that service another good
question to ask is will that pediatrician come and see you in the hospital before discharge with your
new baby number five is what kind of philosophy and resources are available in your pediatrician's
office for things like breastfeeding how do they feel about vaccines how do they feel
about circumcision those are important things to make sure you guys click on yeah and then finally
but and unfortunately an important question to ask is do they take your insurance yeah
after all of this and usually the most important part of the decision is that gut feeling of do
you feel like you click with the provider you've chosen do you feel like you're going to be able
to have open and honest communication and ask questions without feeling silly do you trust
their medical advice and if you ever feel like you have a concern is that provider gonna take
time to listen to you yeah and so this is the important part where the pediatrician or
the pediatric provider is the expert in pediatric medicine but you as the parent are going to be the
expert in your child no one is going to know them better than you and so i would say the two most
important parts of picking a pediatric provider is number one that they have the necessary experience
and training to provide pediatric medicine and care and number two that you have a trusting
relationship with them with open communication if you don't feel like you're finding these in
the first person you meet or interview please if able keep looking and that is where there is
an opportunity to be thinking about this before you have your baby you can reach out to some of
the different groups you're interested in to see if they have this kind of like meet the providers
um event where it can be like an office visit or a zoom call um to sit down and meet them before baby
comes yeah and so i think one thing though that we've met so many different pediatricians they're
just so nice i work with nps these are people that work with children they love kids hopefully you
guys have an easy time finding something that's going to be perfect for you and your families
that's all we have this week we hope this episode helps you choose a provider for your new baby that
you are comfortable with we will see you all next week bye guys we're doctors but not your
doctors anything we've said in this video is for education or entertainment purposes only it is not
medical advice any specific medical questions you have should be directed to your provider