Coincidentally, I have had the opportunity to interact with Dr. Gogia directly as well, so I am including my impression as well after Prabhakaran’s.

Here’s what Prabhakaran had to say about Dr. Gogia:

• very good experience so far.
• really good with children.
• does not give unnecessary medication.
• responds to your questions very promptly.

Now for my impression of Dr. Gogia. First of all, I have to agree with Prabhakaran overall. Below is our experience with Dr. Siddhartha Gogia, who we met after my wife delivered a baby at Max hospital last week. He was the attending pediatrician during the delivery.

Our daughter ‘Aanya’ was born with a slight case of fluid in her lungs which caused her to grunt while breathing. This can happen, and usually clears out on its own. Dr. Gogia was very patient in answering all my questions, and thanks to his calm manner, I felt myself not getting overly worried. This is important because a lot of times doctors tend to act self important and not explain properly what the issue is.

To monitor Aanya, they kept her in the NICU for one day. Dr. Gogia visited her regularly and kept us updated on her status. What I liked was his continuous attitude towards not doing unnecessary tests or giving not required medication. They just kept her under observation.

At this stage, it is very safe for me to say that he looks like a competent pediatrician, and I have decided to continue with him for the follow up sessions for Aanya. Let’s see if he turns out to be as good as the initial impression in the long run.

Here’s some more information about Dr. Gogia:

• he practices out of Max Hospital and his private clinic in DLF Phase IV.
• his contact details are: 9971799012 and gogiasiddhartha@gmail.com.
• he has a website at http://childspecialist.wordpress.com/ – this website contains a collection of articles about various topics related to parenting and child care. On first look, all these articles seem to be copied from various places on the Internet – so these are not his own publication; however, it is still a good place to go to find all this information in one place.

Has anyone consulted with Dr. Gogia – please mention your experiences (good and bad) in the comments.

Mother Care is a well known international brand for parenting and children needs. I have often blogged about how limited the choice of stores in Gurgaon is for maternity clothes (a couple of options here and here), and now there is another that you can add to the list. Here’s my quick fire review of the place based on one visit.

Maternity Clothes

This is certainly a focus for me right now, since my wife is 6 months in. And when we saw this store, we were very happy and went in straight away. Now, there is definitely a dedicated selection for maternity clothes, but it was overall disappointing – not enough daily wear options were there. However, it has better selection than any other store in Gurgaon.

Infant Clothes

Tons of options. You should find what you need. Having said that, we were looking for a gift for a 4 month old, and came back empty handed because we couldn’t find anything that we liked. Once again, the store is way better than anything else in Gurgaon, but still lacks a lot.

One instance pops out – we liked a pair of socks, which were available in green. We wanted the same pair in blue which was also available. But the blue option was only available if you buy it with a cap as well. I found this very frustrating.

Other stuff

There are many other things such as prams, cribs, shoes, etc. It can easily serve as a one stop shop for all your parenting needs.

Conclusion

We think that the lack of options right now is because the store is brand new, and the merchandise is still being setup with a lot of product still not unpacked. It is so new that the location is not even mentioned on their stores page on the Internet (at the time of writing this article).

Overall, a great place.

Here’s where an Early Learning Center such as Intellitots comes in. One of the readers of this blog left a comment about Intellitots and how happy she was after visiting them (thanks Anika for pointing them out). Because of her feedback, I decided to get in touch with Intellitots and get some more information about them.

Intellitots is an activity center which offers a number of parent-toddler and parent-infant programs to stimulate the development of young children. Learning Centers such as Intellitots are pretty common in places developed nations such as USA or Australia, but are only now picking up in India.

About the Team

Intellitots was founded by two moms (Pooja and Shivani) who are both ex-IITians who had gone on to work in MNCs like Adobe, Palm, and Infosys. They have both lived abroad during their working times. Recently, both of them have left their professional lives to devote their time to Intellitots. They are both proud mothers of two.

Pooja and Shivani have partnered with Jimmy Eappen who is a seasoned teacher who was trained at the Julia Gabriel Center for Learning at Singapore. Jimmy specializes in speech, drama, and early childhood education, and manages all the programs at the center.

Activities and Programs

They have a number of programs that are run throughout the week, and you can visit the following page to get a complete listing: Programs. By the looks of the photograph (click the image to get a larger version), all the children are very happy in whatever they are doing (looks to me like they are building a parachute).

Here’s a description provided by Intellitots about their programs (I couldn’t have worded it better):

We offer a variety of activity based learning classes for 0-5 yr olds, designed to foster intellectual, social and physical development.  Activities include learning through music, movement and storytelling. We use age appropriate equipment sourced globally and have a professionally developed international curriculum.

Location and Contact

Intellitots is conveniently located near Galleria, in DLF Phase IV (next to Gate 1 of Ridgewood Estate). They can be reached via sending an email to info@intellitots.in. They are a very responsive bunch of people, and are always very happy to invite you over to their facility.

Conclusion

Based on Anika’s recommendation, and my discussions with Pooja (from Intellitots) I feel that it is a nice place to take your children to. If anyone amongst you have had an experience with Intellitots (good or bad), please leave a comment.