NCCU marks first year of transition

NCCU marks first year of transition

Today marks one year since Mater’s Neonatal Critical Care Unit (NCCU) moved their babies into cohorts based on their reason for admission to improve patient outcomes and streamline medical treatment.

The change was driven by increasing numbers of intensive care patients, with increasing complexity of care.

Prior to the change, babies were admitted to either the intensive care nursery, high dependency nursery or special care nursery.

NCCU is the statewide referral centre for newborn babies with congenital heart disease and the regional referral centre for newborns requiring surgery soon after birth.

In support of the referral process, NCCU created two intensive care areas (preterm/medical and cardiac/surgical), and a special care/transition to home nursery.

Nurse Unit Manager Angela Sly said the transition required significant planning and coordination to ensure impacts to patients, families and staff was kept to a minimum.

“We believed this change was right for our service and there’s no doubt it was a huge team effort,” Angela said.

“We can now look back over the past year and say ‘look what we achieved working together with a single vision’!” she said.

Director of Neonatology Dr Lucy Cooke said the changes had made positive impacts on patient care.

“All teams caring for patients are skilled to do so and the provision and integration of sub-specialist care is much easier in the new model,” Dr Cooke said.

“By admitting babies based on diagnosis, it can be ensured that the care provided to every baby is of the highest quality and appropriate to each baby’s needs,” she said.

Our priority is to constantly improve outcomes for the more than 2000 sick and premature babies cared for in NCCU every year.

Tags:

Mater Babies
This Year
1917
This Month
942
= one - nine

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For urgent assessment at any stage of your pregnancy, please present to your nearest emergency centre or Mater Mothers’ 24/7 Pregnancy Assessment Centre in South Brisbane.

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