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Transforming care for families in the Neonatal Unit
Transforming care for families in the Neonatal Unit
Dr Liz McKechnie, Consultant Neonatologist at Leeds Children’s Hospital talks about how Leeds is leading the way in caring for some of the smallest and sickest babies in the region.
Around 1,800 babies from across Yorkshire are cared for on our units each year and many of these require intensive care or specialist surgery. Our team works closely with fetal medicine and maternity services so that babies with complex problems can be diagnosed, monitored and delivered in a centre with expertise available if urgent treatment is required after birth.
We were the first in the country to launch the Family Integrated Care service, a principle of empowering parents to take control of their baby’s care whilst on a neonatal unit, which is proven to promote better outcomes for both baby and families.
Parents are given coaching on how to care for their babies including taking regular observations, giving medication, taking temperatures, weighing, and day-to-day activities like feeding and changing.
We see first-hand how this approach helps to increase breastfeeding rates at discharge, meaning that babies have better weight gain and are more likely to go home up to a week earlier than babies that have received standard care. Parents who have gained knowledge and confidence through the programme are also significantly less likely to visit the GP with their babies.
