Implementing the practice of early skin-to-skin contact among infants ≥35 weeks gestation born vaginally: a quality improvement study

Abstract

Background: Early skin-to-skin contact (SSC) at birth has been shown to improve neonatal outcomes due to enhanced cardiorespiratory stability, thermoregulation and breastfeeding success.

Local problem: The practice of early SSC was virtually non-existent in our delivery room (DR).

Methods and interventions: The study was conducted in a newly established tertiary care teaching hospital in Western Rajasthan, India. We aimed to improve the median duration of early SSC from 0 min to at least 60 min over 24 weeks in our DR. A quality improvement (QI) team was formed, and all inborn infants ≥35 weeks born vaginally from 9 March 2017 were included. Using the tools of point-of-care QI, we found the lack of standard operating procedure, lack of knowledge among nursing staff regarding early SSC, routine shifting of all infants to radiant warmer, the practice of prioritising birthweight documentation and vitamin K administration as the major hindrances to early SSC. Various change ideas were implemented and tested sequentially through multiple plan-do-study-act (PDSA) cycles to improve the duration of early SSC. Interventions included framing a written policy for SSC, sensitising the nursing staff and resident doctors, actively delaying the alternate priorities, making early SSC a shared responsibility among paediatricians, obstetricians, nursing staff and family members, and continuing SSC in the recovery area of the DR complex.

Results: The duration of early SSC increased from 0 to 67 min without any additional resources. The practice of SSC got well established in the system as reflected by a sustained improvement of 63 min and 72 min, respectively, at the end of 2 months and 4 years after study completion.

Conclusion: Using the QI approach, we established and sustained the practice of early SSC for more than 60 min in our unit by using system analysis and testing change ideas in sequential PDSA cycles.

Keywords: Obstetrics and gynecology; PDSA; Paediatrics; Quality improvement; Teamwork.