Skeetaboat, to the best of my knowledge, the midwife who attended the C/S would accompany the baby and father back to the ward, the father would not go up to the ward with the baby alone. At least, this is what happened after my c/s. I believe that allowing the baby to be transferred from theatre to the ward without a medical representative might be in contravention of the hospital's duty of care.
I am reasonably sure (but happy to be corrected if wrong) that following a birth in the birthing suites, the midwife has to accompany mother and baby to the maternity ward to sign them over - this is no different.
To be honest, I'm not entirely sure. I think in normal circumstances once they are in the ward (where staff are readily on call) then the midwife is no longer required to be in physical attendance, just during the transition.
I was pretty out of it at the time - I had a haemorrhage following my c/s and a really bad recovery so was in theatre for over an hour getting stitched and transfused, then in recovery for over an hour, then went up to the ward. Because I'd had a high temp and so had DS, he was in special care because he was on IV antibiotics as they'd been unable to rule out infection with the initial tests (although it was likely that the temp was due to the epidural), so I actually got to the ward first, then DS was brought in (by DP and a special care nurse) for a visit. I was doped to the gills on morphine and still had limited movement and shaking, so wasn't really able to do more than give him a kiss on the forehead whilst DP held him to me, and then he spent the next two days in special care. Apart from once when they were able to bring him down for a feed, I wasn't able to see him again until the next morning, when I was able to get up and go down to special care myself, but to be honest, even if he hadn't been in special care I wasn't in any condition to actually interact with him without assistance before then.
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