Background: There has been significant progress in reducing perinatal mortality in Japan. However, due to changes in social conditions, the total fertility rate and the number of births are decreasing, whereas the number of low birth weight infants is increasing along with the number of newborn babies that require intensive care. Further, although the number of high-level perinatal medical centers has increased, so has that of infants who need long-term hospitalization. Conversely, the number of regular obstetric facilities has decreased, thus resulting in insufficient beds for neonatal care. To fill this gap, we established a neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) at our hospital. This study aimed to evaluate our new type by comparing the data from ours with that from other facilities.
Methods: The other facilities assessed were two high-level NICU facilities and two regular obstetric facilities. Data, including sex, gestational age, birth weight, Apgar scores at 1 and 5 min, delivery method, and presence of breathing disorders, were extracted from medical records.
Results: The birth weight and gestational age distributions were significantly different in the institutions, except in one facility without a NICU. The new NICU saw more infants with low birth weight and respiratory disorders than the regular obstetric facilities.
Conclusion: The comparison of birth weight and gestational age distributions, cases of respiratory disorders, and delivery methods indicate that our new NICU is positioned as an intermediate facility between a high-level NICU and a regular obstetrics facility.
Keywords: NICU; neonatal intensive care unit level; neonate; respiratory disorder.