Intrahospital variations in antimicrobial profiles may be related to many factors. This study compared causative agents of nosocomial bloodstream infections between a neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) that adopted a ward-tailored antibiotic policy and adult intensive care units (ICUs). Data on organisms from blood cultures obtained from the respective wards between 2005 and 2009 were analyzed...

BACKGROUND Parents of infants hospitalized in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) find themselves in a situation of emotional strain. Communication in the NICU presents special challenges due to parental stress and the complexity of the highly technologized environment. Parents' need for communication may not always be met by the NICU staff. This study aimed to describe strengths and weakne...

Background Weakness of curriculum development in nursing education results in lack of professional skills in graduates. This study was done on master's students in nursing to evaluate challenges of neonatal intensive care nursing curriculum based on context, input, process, and product (CIPP) evaluation model. Materials and Methods This study was conducted with qualitative approach, which was...

Background Medical errors are particularly frequent in Neonatal Intensive Care Units (NICUs) [1], increasing morbidity and mortality of newborns [2]. This category of patients requires the application of high technology and needs individualized medical prescription mainly based on body weight and gestational age[3]. The most frequent event categories are wrong medication, dose, schedule, or inf...

The development of the preterm gut microbiome is important for immediate and longer-term health following birth. We aimed to determine if modifications to the preterm gut on the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) impacted the gut microbiota and metabolome long-term. Stool samples were collected from 29 infants ages 1-3 years post discharge (PD) from a single NICU. Additional NICU samples were ...

The feeding of human milk (milk from the infant's own mother; excluding donor milk) during the newborn intensive care unit (NICU) stay reduces the risk of costly and handicapping morbidities in premature infants. The mechanisms by which human milk provides this protection are varied and synergistic, and appear to change over the course of the NICU stay. The fact that these mechanisms include sp...

BACKGROUND Hospitalization of a neonate in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) can be a stressful event for parents. They need specific information and communication to alleviate their stress, but these parental needs are not met by NICU staff. Exploration of these needs can help health professionals to provide better healthcare services. OBJECTIVES The purpose of this study was to explor...

AIM The aim was to translate the Parental Stressor Scale: Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (PSS: NICU) into the Swedish language and to evaluate the psychometric properties of the Swedish version. METHOD The PSS: NICU was translated into Swedish using the process of forward-backward translation. Thereafter, an internal panel of neonatal nurses (n = 10) assessed face and content validity and a pan...

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) is a significant cause of morbidity and mortality in NICUs and PICUs. Our objective was to assess the burden of MRSA colonization on admission, study the time trends, and examine the significance of MRSA colonization in this population. METHODS PubMed and Embase databases were consulted. Studies that reported prevalen...

BACKGROUND The amount of clinical information that providers encounter daily creates an environment for information overload and medical error. To create a more efficient EMR human-computer interface, we aimed to understand clinical information needs among NICU providers. METHODS A web-based survey to evaluate 98 data items was created and distributed to NICU providers. Participants were aske...