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Family practice, hands down. Then when you need an appt and baby needs an appt, you can go back to back. They have a good network of specialists for referral and tend to have a great concept of what they know vs what is more complex and should be seen elsewhere.
We switched my son from a pediatrician to a family medicine doctor in a practice that only sees kids... and I see a family doc who will see me and my husband and baby #2.

I'm an FP so I'm biased but I think the most important thing is the relationship. It's also very nice to all have the same doctor.

Actually we had better luck with shots at our FP. They always made sure to have multiple nurses to give the vaccine. We see a ped now that we dislike, and we are trying to switch back to a FP now. So I absolutely recommend a FP ours was great knew us when we walked in and when we called our ped is lucky to know who are kids are or the last time we saw them.

I should state that we have restively healthy kids and we knew our FP would recommend a ped if anything was ever out of her hands

oh, yes, agreed with pps, the nursing staff does the shots.
we have had a varied experience with them (ped vs FM practice) that doesn't correlate with which doctor we saw. The best shots my son got were from the health dept when we had just moved and were between doctors. So, I wouldn't decide based on the people who do immunization s.

I am a nurse and we use a family practice Doctor, I love that we can make a group/family appointments, the doctor REALLY knows all of our histories and medical concerns which has actually helped him with diagnosing issues with our kids. When we had a concern that required being followed by a paediatrician (our daughter has a VSD and we followed with a paediatrician until cardiology was comfortable with how it was resolving) we were referred to one and saw him instead, then when he was comfortable he released her care back to our family doctor. It is a great experience.

In my province you don't have a choice - family Dr unless there is a specific reason to see a ped, then you are referred

I absolutely love our family doc, all 4 of us go to him. He knows our history and the minute I call to make an appointment they tell me to come right in. He even did a house call for us when my DD was quite sick on a weekend and he didn't want her waiting in the ER. I couldn't be happier.

we get all our shots at public health so no advice there

The system here is very different. We have a family doctor (you would say FP, here its a GP) - we don't have much choice because most practices have "catchment areas" - then, if the GP feels the issue needs more specialist attention, he/she then refers the patient to a specialist (paediatrician, dermatologist etc) at the hospital.

My experience is that it's 100% down to the individual professionals and not their titles or specific qualifications....

Our old GP was terrible. He was very elderly, stuck in his ways and thought he knew it all. He diagnosed E with asthma as a baby (Dr Google and Dr Google said that it was unusual to diagnose before 3). He went crazy when I asked for a second opinion - he shouted at me!

We were referred to a paediatrician who was clearly very knowledgeable and I felt we were in very safe hands, but his bedside manner wasn't very good. At the end of our appointment, he just got up and left - his swivel chair went whizzing across the room - without saying goodbye or "that's that's the end". We waited for a few minutes the went out and asked a nurse if we should go home!

When we moved house, we switched to a new GP who we love. She is kind, approachable, knowledgeable and isn't afraid to admit when she's not sure and needs to refer on. I love that we all see the same doctor.

We go to a family practice but it's a husband wife team and they have seven kids. So they are very comfortable with kids and babies. They are very laid back and conservative in their medicine which we like. The nurses are great with shots.

The only reason I would switch is if we had reflux issues or other more complex newborn issues. Then I would want advice of a very up to date pediatrician. But since we are using them for just well child visits basically it's been fine

Also biased: I'm a family practice doctor. But I think if you have a great relationship with a doctor then stick with them! We're great at pediatrics My nurses are fabulous at shots and kids get a book to keep at every visit!

My mother is a pediatrician, so it never occurred to me to not take the kids to a pediatrician. Also, FP doctors are in very short supply around here--neither DH nor I have doctors we actually like, but there isn't anything better--so we didn't have a lot of choice.

What I like about the kids' medical care:
-We have a designated primary doctor that sees both kids for all well-child check-ups. I feel like he knows our kids really well, and it's nice to have that consistency.
-We got to select our primary ped from anyone at the practice, and we personally love him. He fits our expectations for care well and it's really clear that he stays up to date on kids' care. (All doctors have continuing education I think, so maybe our experience with him isn't unusual. But, in addition to a great experience during visits, he has done follow-up research on issues for our kids and called us after-hours to share what he's found.)
-But when either kid is sick (either for an after-hours call or a sick visit), we always get to see/talk to a pediatrician so they are always knowledgeable about kids' care.
-The nurses all love children, are comfortable caring for them, and seem to have good strategies for shots, etc.
-The waiting are is set up for kids.

I don't have much experience with family practice, so all of these pros might be just as true with many family practice doctors.

Family practice all the way. We see one, and our whole family sees him! He even did my husband's vasectomy. They're fabulous.

@Torchwood: That is amazing.

We chose a family doctor that a friend recommended. I made the choice because I figured LO would be less exposed to a million other kids' germs than she would be in a bustling pediatric practice versus this fairly tiny family clinic. And also extremely important, I liked that I would be able to get a last-minute visit much more easily with her than I would with an uber-popular hotshot "best in the field" pediatrician (people in this city tend to flock toward "the best" ones, and I can only imagine how long it takes to get an appointment). If LO ever had a real medical problem, sure then of course we'd go see a respected specialist. But for her well-child visits and ear infections, we really don't need all that.

I have received some out-of-date advice from her (she wasn't informed about <6 mo sunscreen recommendations and hadn't heard of BLW) but that's really not a big deal to me since I do my own research on all those non-medical parenting issues anyway. As for the nurses, one of them really knows her shit when giving shots and the other guy seems more nervous, but I really have a hard time imagining that infant shots would go any more smoothly with a more experienced nurse - they were super quick and she screamed, then she got over it, the end.

I also liked her personality and I liked that I can walk to her office from my front door.