Choosing a Pediatrician

Hellooooooooo, my lovelies!  Hope everyone is having a great Thursday.  For the first time this week, I felt slightly better today...let's hope this continues!

Now that we are on all of the waiting lists that we want to be on for childcare (interviewing of nannies/looking into that process can wait, since we wouldn't need care until next summer), it is on to another important topic: pediatricians.  I know that through my dramatic tendencies I have made every decision seem like it is of the utmost importance, but this one truly is a big one.  I will start out by telling you what is important to me in a pediatrician for my child:

• Dan and I feel comfortable with them, and they talk "to" us instead of "down to" or "at" us. 
• They are welcoming and open to questions.  They take time to discuss problems and listen to our concerns.
• It is relatively close to our house.  The idea of driving 20+ minutes with a screaming and sick child is not appealing.

The list goes on, but I tried to narrow it down to the "top 3" so as not to bore you.  A lot of Moms have some concerns with group practices and prefer a smaller practice with one or two doctors, but I am not as concerned with that, provided that it works like my gynecologist does: you see your doctor by appointment, but know that in an emergency situation you may have to see someone else depending on availability.  I would prefer not to have 20 doctors in the practice, but I am okay with four or five, I think.

So, with all of that said, we began the research process quite a few months back by reaching out to friends in the area for recommendations on their pediatricians.  We were overwhelmed with responses.  We compared the list we got to the list of recommended pediatricians that was provided by my OB/GYN when we first found out we were pregnant, and narrowed it down some that way.  Finally, we looked at proximity to our house and were able to further narrow the list down to a manageable number.  So, now we have our list.  What's next? 

I have done a lot of research on this (I'm sure you're shocked), and got a very helpful article in one of my babycenter e-mails the other day that you should check out if you are a Mommy-to-be and have some time.  I always knew that once we narrowed the list down to a top 3-4, we would want to conduct interviews, and I am in the process of setting those up now.  The main problem I'm running into is: what kinds of questions should I ask?  And how will I know whether we've chosen the right one?  There are tons of checklists that can be found online, but honestly a lot of them are like 50 questions long, and I just do not have the time or the energy.  Plus, I feel like that is a little overboard even for me.  If I waltz into some pediatrician's office with 50 questions they might tell me they are no longer taking patients, even if they are - no one wants to deal with a crazy woman I'm sure.  I've started a list of questions based on the things that are important to me:

• Which hospital are you affiliated with?
• Will the doctor (or someone else in the practice) see my baby in the hospital or will the first contact be her first office visit?
• How are appointments handled for sick children?  Is there a good chance my child will get to see her own doctor?
• How do I reach the doctor if the baby gets sick after hours?  When my doctor is not on call, who covers?
• How does the office handle telephone inquiries?  does it set aside specific times for parents to call in with questions, or is there an open advice line during office hours?  I know my pediatrician growing up had no rules around this - whenever there was a question, they never made my Mom feel uncomfortable about calling to ask, and they always got back to her after talking to the doctor that day.  I really like that.

There are more questions on this list that aren't as important, so I left them off, but you get the gist of what I'm trying to do here.  So my question to you is this: what types of questions are most important to ask the a potential pediatrician in our interview?  Are there any that are vital that I've left off my list?  And how will I know if I've chosen the correct one?  Are there other important considerations that I haven't thought of to factor in when deciding on a doctor?  Help!  Thanks in advance.  :-)

I can't believe another week is already ending, but I'm excited for the weekend!

Sarah