Enhancing Developing Relationships with Skin-to-Skin Contact

Over 15 million premature infants are born annually around the world. It has been optimistically yet incorrectly proposed that healthy preterm infants without major complications eventually catch-up developmentally to full-term infants. Maternal touch, especially during skin to-skin contact (SSC) has the potential to reduce adverse consequences of prematurity. The aim of this dissertation is to increase understanding of mechanisms that link parent infant contact to bio-behavioral responses for parents and their healthy preterm infants. This study is an important step in exploring oxytocin as a potential moderator to improve infant developmental outcomes and the effects of SSC on the mother, father, infant and their developing relationships. SSC activates oxytocin release in mothers, fathers and healthy preterm infants. Infant oxytocin responses were similar whether the infant was held by the mother or father. SSC decreases salivary cortisol levels for infants held by their mother and father. SSC also decreases parental stress and anxiety. Parents and infants who have higher oxytocin levels have more synchronous and responsive interactions. Nurses can use SSC as a strategy to decrease stress in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit for parents as well as premature infants to provide an opportunity to enhance developing relationships and support parental engagement. Another important concept to consider is utilizing these findings to influence policy change at a systemic level in regards to education for health care professionals, and the integration of skin-to-skin contact into clinical practice of the NICU along with community awareness and the influence of using SSC to improve health outcomes

Golden Hours Care of the Very Low Birth Weight Neonate

Dorothy Vittner (with Jacqueline M. McGrath, Ana F. Diallo, and Haifa Abou Samra) is a contributing author, Integration of Developmentally Supportive and Family Centered Care Interventions during the Golden Hour , Chapter 22 pp.391-405.https://digitalcommons.fairfield.edu/nursing-books/1088/thumbnail.jp

Developmental care pathway for hospitalised infants with CHD: on behalf of the Cardiac Newborn Neuroprotective Network, a Special Interest Group of the Cardiac Neurodevelopmental Outcome Collaborative

Infants and children born with CHD are at significant risk for neurodevelopmental delays and abnormalities. Individualised developmental care is widely recognised as best practice to support early neurodevelopment for medically fragile infants born premature or requiring surgical intervention after birth. However, wide variability in clinical practice is consistently demonstrated in units caring for infants with CHD. The Cardiac Newborn Neuroprotective Network, a Special Interest Group of the Cardiac Neurodevelopmental Outcome Collaborative, formed a working group of experts to create an evidence-based developmental care pathway to guide clinical practice in hospital settings caring for infants with CHD. The clinical pathway, Developmental Care Pathway for Hospitalized Infants with Congenital Heart Disease, includes recommendations for standardised developmental assessment, parent mental health screening, and the implementation of a daily developmental care bundle, which incorporates individualised assessments and interventions tailored to meet the needs of this unique infant population and their families. Hospitals caring for infants with CHD are encouraged to adopt this developmental care pathway and track metrics and outcomes using a quality improvement framework

Developmental care pathway for hospitalised infants with CHD: On behalf of the Cardiac Newborn Neuroprotective Network, a Special Interest Group of the Cardiac Neurodevelopmental Outcome Collaborative

Infants and children born with CHD are at significant risk for neurodevelopmental delays and abnormalities. Individualised developmental care is widely recognised as best practice to support early neurodevelopment for medically fragile infants born premature or requiring surgical intervention after birth. However, wide variability in clinical practice is consistently demonstrated in units caring for infants with CHD. The Cardiac Newborn Neuroprotective Network, a Special Interest Group of the Cardiac Neurodevelopmental Outcome Collaborative, formed a working group of experts to create an evidence-based developmental care pathway to guide clinical practice in hospital settings caring for infants with CHD. The clinical pathway, Developmental Care Pathway for Hospitalized Infants with Congenital Heart Disease, includes recommendations for standardised developmental assessment, parent mental health screening, and the implementation of a daily developmental care bundle, which incorporates individualised assessments and interventions tailored to meet the needs of this unique infant population and their families. Hospitals caring for infants with CHD are encouraged to adopt this developmental care pathway and track metrics and outcomes using a quality improvement framework