A Do No Harm Technical Brief
Every year 15 million newborns are born preterm and many others have life-threatening conditions that require hospitalization. Family engagement in inpatient care of small and sick newborns leads to better health and developmental outcomes, improved patient and family experience of care, enhanced clinician and staff satisfaction, and wiser allocation of resources. Conversely, a lack of systemic support for parental participation may result in unintentional harm to both newborns and their families. Engaging families as active caregivers during inpatient newborn care requires context-specific adaptation and flexibility.
This brief highlights how integrating parents as caregivers during the inpatient period can enhance the newborn’s short- and long-term wellbeing. Moreover, providing emotional, educational and practical support to families of newborns is an important responsibility of providers and health systems, requiring training and resources.
The Every Preemie—SCALE project is pleased to share the Do No Harm Technical Brief Series. This series highlights the safe and effective use of specific inpatient newborn care interventions, with the guiding principle of “Do No Harm”. The briefs are designed to provide stakeholders with evidence-based information regarding safe and effective inpatient care in low-resource settings as an important step to avoid harm and improve health outcomes for newborns. See complete series here.