I would like to recognize the NICU team at Penn Medicine Chester County Hospital for their dedication to parent support and family-centered care. This need was recognized more than ever over this past year. More and more families were demonstrating signs of trauma and distress as they navigated their newborn's admission to NICU in light of the pandemic. Restrictions on visitation and family absence only increased the feelings of ambiguous loss and distress among our NICU parents. Some babies are here for several months; born as early as 23- 24 weeks which just increased the stress on the parents and other family members. These stressors include bonding with their baby, worrying about time off if the baby is here for a prolonged time period, and finances.

Our nurses turned to best practice in order to engage our parents in the care of their child, as research has shown this improves parent’s confidence, decreases trauma, and improves outcomes which ultimately decreases the length of stay. Prior to admission if the parents are admitted and are able to view a video and tour the unit. Saving baths for the parents to give their children, Bonding with Books, and feeding their children are just a few of the opportunities parents have to care for their children and decrease some of their stress levels.

In collaboration with Physicians, Physical and Speech therapists, Lactation consultants, Social work, and Nutritionists, we the nurses implemented available resources to support these families. During the pandemic, we launched a NICU-only Facebook page called Tiny to Mighty, which allows graduates to post success stories of their children for other NICU families to view. The use of social media, in particular our website, has given them hope that they too will share the same successes. This website also serves as a link to keep families involved in the latest’s NICU happenings, such as reunions and events.

Our Unit is currently piloting the Social Determinants of Health (SDOC)screening so that we may recognize disparities in food, transportation, and self-care and provide resources for our families. Our Social worker in is communication with the clinic and secures meal bags for families where food is a big concern. For years we have had the ability to provide gift cards for WAWA and UBER to help with meals and transportation to and from the NICU. We are also able to provide our parents opportunities to apply for assistance through Project Sweet Pea which is an organization started by parents of NICU graduates. Through screening tools such as SDOH, we also are able to track where services are most in need for our given community, potentially gaining even more services for our community.

We do our best to celebrate every milestone be it finishing their first bottle or growing a little bigger by hanging awards at their bedside. The parents look forward to these milestones and are happy others share the same joy in their child’s success. Each month the nurses develop a theme and make name cards, and other signs out of baby footprints to celebrate the occasion.

We even honor one of our nurses who passed away before being able to retire by celebrating a Lily Day for Loretta. Our babies are dressed in Lily Pulitzer print apparel and families receive a hand-crocheted blanket and flower. You will also see our NICU babies as the stars of our social media site each and every holiday as they are seen donning a beautifully crocheted hat or sometimes an outfit by our very own NICU Director.

While we do our best to make their NICU stay as family-centered as possible, it is still very difficult for parents to leave the hospital without their child. We utilize the Super Hero Pajama project which sends home a gift box to moms with a letter saying they are not alone, and families are there for them if they need someone to talk to. Once home, parents are able to view their babies 24 hours a using the Angel Eye camera, thanks to the generous donation of many to our foundation. Once discharged from the NICU parents can access websites with resources such as education, and baby care to further feel a part of their baby’s care.

We have established long-lasting relationships with our families as a result of these initiatives. Many return each year to join our team in the March for Babies. For the last 12 years, this event has served as a Spring Reunion. Our families were always so excited to gather, but during the pandemic that they marched virtually and sent pictures of their children full of joy as they celebrated their successes. These reunions have been so popular we have started to hold a second reunion in the fall each year for our Super Heroes to come and show the staff how they have grown. Last year over 100 participants gathered at a local park.

The relationships our nurses have developed with our patients and graduates through these initiatives have brought our families back year after year, looking for ways to support present NICU families. Many families send update cards on the holidays or around the time when their child was here in the unit and on their child’s birthday. Families will return with arms full of gift bags and gift card donations giving our present families hope that they soon will be home with their own child.

We are looking forward to continually finding new ways to support our NICU families. Currently, two of our NICU nurses are lead coordinators in developing a NICU virtual Patient Family Advisory Committee (PFAC) and are working with physicians and hospitals. PFAC members gather feedback from our recent graduate families in order to meet the needs of our families. Based on this feedback have updated our discharge survey questions and have had questions translated into Spanish in order to capture the feedback for our Hispanic population. We are looking forward to sharing the feedback with our team members.