[SETTINGSAIL]

I am in an RN to BSN program and set to graduate in December and will be back to travel nursing in January. I’m an ER nurse but did my school practicum in the Neonatal ICU. I have a unit assignment due this week. The assignment is to collaborate online with a nursing colleague in another region about a current issue within my practicum area. The issue I have chosen is discuss is multiples sharing beds or at least being placed in incubators next to each other. Where I did my practicum, we had twins and even quads in different rooms and not even side by side. I felt like this was very hard on the parents as some even timed how long they spent with each child so no baby got more time then the other. When I asked why the children were not together, they said it would be too hard for the staff to get more then one admission to a room at the same time. In addition, it would be hard to care for two such high acuity patients and they would rather staff one nurse with a high acuity and a medium acuity patient. My question to you is how have things be done at the facilities you work at? Are they always placed in separate beds side by side, do you co-bed, or are they in separate rooms? Your thoughts are very much appreciated.

[CU76RN]

Hi!
Hope that your assignment is going well. I'm sure you have found that there is alot of research on this subject.

I work in a small 18 bed NICU. We have 3 sections to our unit--not separate rooms. When twins are in Intensive care status they are put in whatever bed is available at the time. Being a small unit, this still puts them in rather close proximity.

We do cobed, but only after the babies are stable and able to be in an open crib. They are put in a regular size crib, not a small bassinet. Triplets are treated the same way. I have found, in my experience, that putting them in the same Isolette gets the babies too hot.

Cobedding in an open crib is beneficial for the babies. They seem to be more content and stay warm from being close to each other. I believe there is some literature that supports the idea that the babies grow faster and are able to go home sooner.

After the babies are cobedded, if one has some kind of problem, such as temp instability or infection, etc, they are separated until the sick one is well.

Guess the bottom line is that we cobed after the infants are stable and basically "growing premies". We never cobed sick or unstable infants.

This is rather scattered but was just typing as I thought of things. Hope was of some help. Let me know if I can answer any other questions. Have been a NICU RN for 27 years.

Good Luck!
Janet
South Carolina