A Hospital-Level Intervention to Improve Outcomes of Opioid Exposed Newborns

The purpose of this quality improvement project was to determine if non-pharmacologic strategies such as a rooming-in approach to care for newborns at risk of developing neonatal abstinence syndrome (NAS) would reduce total length of stay (LOS) and reduce the need for pharmacologic treatment.

This was a quality improvement project utilizing a retrospective chart review. Records of newborns with in-utero methadone or buprenorphine exposure were reviewed who were born between January 2016-July 2017 and July 2017-August 2018 at Wellspan Health York Hospital. Starting in July 2017, newborns exposed to opioids who transitioned normally remained with their mothers for monitoring in the newborn nursery. Monitoring for withdrawal was continued on the pediatric floor after the mother's discharge from the post-partum floor.

The primary outcome of total LOS was reduced from 14 days to 10.1 days (p = 0.014). The total length of pharmacologic treatment decreased from 15.68 days to 9.71 days (p = 0.023).

A rooming-in approach to care including management on a pediatric floor can reduce total length of stay and the duration of pharmacologic treatment in newborns with NAS. Newborns with NAS can be safely managed in an inpatient pediatric floor.

Implementing a rooming-in approach to care of newborns at risk of developing NAS can improve outcomes through a decreased length of hospital stay and decreased duration of pharmacologic treatment. This approach improves access to critical care services by safely monitoring newborns with NAS on an inpatient pediatric floor.