Intubation training in neonatal patients: a review of one trainee's first 150 procedures

The experience in performing intubation procedures gained by a single operator has been previously reported for adult, but not for neonatal patients.

In order to evaluate the process of skill acquisition, we reviewed the first 150 neonatal tracheal intubations performed by a pediatric trainee.

For logbook purposes, a pediatric trainee prospectively recorded all neonatal tracheal intubation procedures that she performed during a 5-year training period.

During the study period, Nicoletta Doglioni performed for 152 intubation procedures. Of the 152 procedures, the author was successful on 120 (79%) occasions. Of these, 77 (64%) were performed on the first attempt, and 43 (36%) on the second attempt. Author successful intubation improved by the training year 1 (67%) to training year 2 (79%), 3 (77%), 4 (80%) and 5 (91%), respectively.

Intubation success rate progressively improved with training year experience. A recommended level of proficiency, defined as 90% of procedure success, was obtained after 100 attempts suggesting that a significant amount of experience is needed for obtaining proficiency in neonatal intubation.