An intervention to decrease time to parents' first hold of infants in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit requiring...

Area of Science:

• Neonatal care
• Pediatric intensive care
• Quality improvement in healthcare

Background:

• Barriers exist to parental skin-to-skin contact for critically ill neonates.
• Current practices show prolonged time to first parental hold for neonates needing respiratory support.
• Low percentage of neonates are held by parents within the first 24 hours.

Purpose of the Study:

• To decrease the median time to first parental hold for neonates requiring respiratory support.
• To increase the percentage of neonates held within the first 24 hours after birth.
• To identify and overcome barriers to parental holding in the neonatal intensive care unit.

Main Methods:

• Utilized Lean Six Sigma methodology to identify barriers and opportunities for improvement.
• Implemented a multifactorial improvement bundle.
• Focused on reducing the time to first parental hold for critically ill neonates.

Main Results:

• Median time to first parental hold significantly reduced from 6.4 to 1.2 days (p < 0.01).
• Percentage of infants held within 24 hours increased from 6% to 35%.
• No increase in adverse events associated with parental holding was observed.

Conclusions:

• An improvement bundle effectively reduced the time to first parental hold for infants requiring respiratory support.
• The intervention successfully facilitated earlier parental-neonatal bonding.
• Quality improvement initiatives can overcome barriers to essential neonatal care practices.