Heel Warming in Very-Low-Birth-Weight Newborns for Capillary Blood Sampling.

Objective: To determine if performing heel stick procedures for capillary blood sampling without prior heel warming is noninferior to the standard practice of warming the heel in very-low-birth-weight newborns.

Design: Noninferiority randomized control trial.

Setting: The study took place in two Level 3 NICUs in The Netherlands.

The fundamentals of a parental peer-to-peer support program in the NICU: a scoping review.

Purpose And Background: Parental peer support is part of the Family Integrated Care model in NICUs. However, little attention has been devoted to the specific content and organization of parental peer support programs. This scoping review aimed to identify (1) the preferred content of a parental peer support intervention, (2) the organizational processes, and (3) the suggested educational curriculum for peer support providers within existing programs in neonatal care.

Parents in Neonatal Pain Management-An International Survey of Parent-Delivered Interventions and Parental Pain Assessment.

Background: While parent-delivered pain management has been demonstrated to effectively reduce neonatal procedural pain responses, little is known about to what extent it is utilized. Our aim was to explore the utilization of parents in neonatal pain management and investigate whether local guidelines promote parent-delivered interventions.

Methods: A web-based survey was distributed to neonatal units worldwide.

Getting a grip in the middle of chaos: Preparing for preterm parenthood during a high-risk pregnancy - Parental experiences and needs.

Aim: Admitting an infant to a neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) is stressful for parents. A great source of stress is the loss of their desired parental role. This study explores parents' experiences and needs during a high-risk pregnancy in preparation for their role as parents of a preterm infant.

Symptoms of depression in parents after discharge from NICU associated with family-centred care.

Aims: The aim of this study was to examine the potential association of family-centred care as perceived by parents during a NICU stay with parents' depressive symptoms at discharge and at 4 months corrected for infant age.

Design: A longitudinal, multicentre cohort study was conducted from 2018 to 2020 in 23 NICUs across 15 countries.

Methods: Parents (n = 635 mothers, n = 466, fathers) of infants (n = 739) born before 35 weeks of gestation and admitted to the participating NICUs were enrolled to the study during the first weeks of their infants' hospitalizations.

Strict isolation requires a different approach to the family of hospitalised patients with COVID-19: A rapid qualitative study.

Background: The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic influenced family-centred care dramatically due to restricting visiting policies. In this new situation, nurses were challenged to develop new approaches to involve family members in patient care. A better understanding of these changes and the experiences of nurses is essential to make an adaptation of procedures, and to secure a family-centred approach in care as much as possible.

Protocolized Versus Nonprotocolized Weaning to Reduce the Duration of Invasive Mechanical Weaning in Neonates: A Systematic Review of All Types of Studies.

Mechanical ventilation is one of the most commonly used treatments in neonatology. Prolonged mechanical ventilation is associated with deleterious outcomes. To reduce the ventilation duration, weaning protocols have been developed to achieve extubation in adult and pediatric care in a safe and uniform manner.

Clinical recommendations for pain, sedation, withdrawal and delirium assessment in critically ill infants and children: an ESPNIC position statement for healthcare professionals.

Background: This position statement provides clinical recommendations for the assessment of pain, level of sedation, iatrogenic withdrawal syndrome and delirium in critically ill infants and children. Admission to a neonatal or paediatric intensive care unit (NICU, PICU) exposes a child to a series of painful and stressful events. Accurate assessment of the presence of pain and non-pain-related distress (adequacy of sedation, iatrogenic withdrawal syndrome and delirium) is essential to good clinical management and to monitoring the effectiveness of interventions to relieve or prevent pain and distress in the individual patient.

Protocolized versus non-protocolized weaning for reducing the duration of invasive mechanical ventilation in newborn infants.

Background: Mechanical ventilation is a life-saving intervention for critically ill newborn infants with respiratory failure admitted to a neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). Ventilating newborn infants can be challenging due to small tidal volumes, high breathing frequencies, and the use of uncuffed endotracheal tubes. Mechanical ventilation has several short-term, as well as long-term complications.

European neonatal intensive care nursing research priorities: an e-Delphi study.

Objective: This study aimed to identify and prioritise neonatal intensive care nursing research topics across Europe using an e-Delphi technique.

Design: An e-Delphi technique with three questionnaire rounds was performed. Qualitative responses of round one were analysed by content analysis and research statements were generated to be ranged on importance on a scale of 1-6 (not important to most important).

An electronic delphi study to establish pediatric intensive care nursing research priorities in twenty European countries*.

Objectives: To identify and to establish research priorities for pediatric intensive care nursing science across Europe.

Design: A modified three-round electronic Delphi technique was applied. Questionnaires were translated into seven different languages.

Development and growth in very preterm infants in relation to NIDCAP in a Dutch NICU: two years of follow-up.

Aim: To study development and growth in relation to newborn individualized developmental and assessment program (NIDCAP) for infants born with a gestational age of less than 30 weeks.

Methods: Developmental outcome of surviving infants, 25 in the NIDCAP group and 24 in the conventional care group, in a prospective phase-lag cohort study performed in a Dutch level III neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) was compared. Main outcome measure was the Bayley scales of infant development-II (BSID-II) at 24 months corrected age.

A survey on job satisfaction among nursing staff before and after introduction of the NIDCAP model of care in a level III NICU in the Netherlands.

Purpose: To study the effect of introduction of the Newborn Individualized Developmental Care and Assessment Program (NIDCAP) on nursing staff job satisfaction.

Subjects: Registered nurses, with specialist neonatal qualifications or in training, in a level III neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) in the Netherlands.

Design And Methods: A survey was performed before 2001 and 6 months after (2003) the introduction of NIDCAP as the new model of care.

Right atrial inflow obstruction of the inferior vena cava due to atrial septal aneurysm and an elongated Eustachian valve.

We describe a patient with oedema of the legs and ascites due to right atrial (RA) inflow obstruction, caused by atrial septal aneurysm (ASA) and an elongated Eustachian valve (EV). Both structural abnormalities created a narrow inflow channel to the free RA cavity. RA inflow obstruction is usually related to constrictive pericardial disease and pericardial tamponade.

Individualized developmental care in a Dutch NICU: short-term clinical outcome.

Aim: To compare the short-term clinical outcomes of Newborn Individualized Developmental Care and Assessment Program (NIDCAP) and conventional care.

Methods: A prospective phase-lag cohort study was performed in a Dutch tertiary level neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). Infants born before 30 weeks of gestational age (GA) were included, 26 in the conventional and 25 in the NIDCAP group.

How satisfied are parents supported by nurses with the NIDCAP model of care for their preterm infant?

The main purpose of implementing the Newborn Individualized Developmental Care and Assessment Program (NIDCAP) in our neonatal intensive care unit from the perspective of quality of care was to bring about an improvement in the satisfaction of parents. This was measured by means of the NICU-Parent Satisfaction Form and the Nurse Parent Support Tool. Parents were significantly more satisfied with care given according to NIDCAP principles than they were with the traditional care for their premature born babies.

COMFORT scale: a reliable and valid method to measure the amount of stress of ventilated preterm infants.

Objective: Assessment of clinimetric properties and diagnostic quality of a stress measurement scale (COMFORT scale).

Design: Sample of an open population.

Setting: Neonatology department (Neonatal Intensive Care Unit), Academic Medical Centre/Emma Children's Hospital, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.

Successful surgery using recombinant factor VIIa for recurrent, idiopathic nonulcer duodenal bleeding in a patient with Glanzmann's thrombasthenia.

A 68-year-old man with Glanzmann's thrombasthenia suffered from recurrent cryptogenic bleeding originating in the upper duodenal flexure. Extensive endoscopic procedures and medical treatments were unsuccessful and proximal duodenectomy was proposed. In preceding years platelet transfusions had often had a suboptimal result and were complicated by allergic reactions.

Hickman catheter-related infections in neutropenic patients: insertion in the operating theater versus insertion in the radiology suite.

Purpose: To determine the influence of microbial air quality during Hickman catheter insertion in the operating theater versus insertion in the radiology suite on the incidence of catheter-related infections (CRIs).

Patients And Methods: Hemato-oncologic patients with prolonged neutropenia on antimicrobial prophylaxis were entered onto the study. Catheters were inserted by experienced radiologists under sonographic and fluoroscopic guidance.

Continuous infusion of recombinant factor VIIa in patients with haemophilia and inhibitors. Experience in The Netherlands and Belgium.

Background: Initial clinical experience with recombinant factor VIIa (rVIIa) for treatment of haemophilia patients with inhibitors against factor VIII or IX has been obtained by administration of rVIIa by repeated intravenous bolus injections. However, continuous infusion of rVIIa may be a more appropriate administration method if prolonged treatment is indicated.

Methods: We have surveyed and analysed the initial experience with continuous infusion of rVIIa in the Netherlands and Belgium.

GM-CSF receptor targeted treatment of primary AML in SCID mice using Diphtheria toxin fused to huGM-CSF.

The severe combined immunodeficient (SCID) mouse model may be used to evaluate new approaches for the treatment of acute myeloid leukemia (AML). We have previously demonstrated the killing of SCID mouse leukemia initiating cells by in vitro incubation with human GM-CSF fused to Diphtheria toxin (DT-huGM-CSF). In this report, we show that in vivo treatment with DT-huGM-CSF eliminates AML growth in SCID mice.

Clonal expansion of Staphylococcus epidermidis strains causing Hickman catheter-related infections in a hemato-oncologic department.

The detailed analysis of 411 strains of coagulase-negative staphylococci (CoNS) obtained from 40 neutropenic hemato-oncologic patients (61 Hickman catheter episodes) on intensive chemotherapy is described. By random amplification of polymorphic DNA (RAPD) analysis, a total of 88 different genotypes were detected: 51 in air samples and 30 in skin cultures prior to insertion, 12 in blood cultures after insertion, and only 5 involved in catheter-related infections (CRI). Two RAPD genotypes of Staphylococcus epidermidis predominated, and their prevalence increased during patient hospitalization.

Infectious complications of radiologically inserted Hickman catheters in patients with hematologic disorders.

Purpose: To assess the incidence of infections and its influence on the survival of radiologically inserted Hickman catheters (HCs) in patients with hematologic disorders and to determine factors associated with premature HC removal.

Methods: Survival and complications of 175 HCs in 115 patients were studied retrospectively. To describe the data the Kaplan-Meier method and the log-rank test were used, using the date of HC removal due to HC-related infection as endpoint.

Transplantation of human umbilical cord blood cells in macrophage-depleted SCID mice: evidence for accessory cell involvement in expansion of immature CD34+CD38- cells.

In vivo expansion and multilineage outgrowth of human immature hematopoietic cell subsets from umbilical cord blood (UCB) were studied by transplantation into hereditary immunodeficient (SCID) mice. The mice were preconditioned with Cl2MDP-liposomes to deplete macrophages and 3.5 Gy total body irradiation (TBI).