DOHA: Women’s Hospital has implemented a lifesaving quality improvement project for babies born prematurely.
The ‘Golden Hour Delivery Room Management’ adopts global evidenced-based practice to provide the best possible care to extreme preterm babies to ensure their optimal outcome (to improve the survival rate and quality of life and reduce morbidity). These include infants with a gestational age of less than 29 weeks or a birth weight of less than 1,000 grams.
“The Golden Hour is considered the first 60 minutes of a very premature baby’s life where a highly-specialised multidisciplinary team carries out team-oriented and task-driven protocols. These may include resuscitation, followed by gentle ventilation, thermo-regulation, early intravenous parenteral nutrition and early administration of antibiotics to treat potential infections, a known trigger in preterm birth,” said Dr Hilal Al Rifai, Medical Director of the hospital and Director, Neonatal/Perinatal Services and Qatar Newborn Screening Programme.
“This enhances the baby’s chance of survival and short- and long-term health outcomes.”
Under the initiative, the hospital has incorporated safer alternatives in the management of premature infants such as non-invasive ventilation using Continuous Positive Airway Pressure. The treatment involves positioning a mask by the nostril/nose while air is blown at a constant pressure to keep the baby’s airways open, followed by the selective use of surfactant, a fatty substance deficient in the air sacs of the lungs of premature babies, which will help prevent the lungs from collapsing and minimise the work of breathing by the infant. The methods have replaced the conventional invasive management techniques.
After the initial stabilisation in the delivery room, babies are transferred with extreme care by highly-skilled and experienced staff to the newly-built Tiny Baby Unit for care. The golden hour protocol has improved quality of life for high-risk newborns, including baby Robin who was recently treated for Tracheoesophageal fistula. “TEF can be life-threatening if not treated right away. It can cause the child to breathe saliva and fluids from the upper part of the esophagus into the lungs and it can cause choking and pneumonia, and normal feeding by mouth would not be possible. Instead of reaching the stomach, the milk would flow to the lungs resulting in life-threatening consequences,” said Dr Amani Saeed Ibrahim, Specialist, Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at the hospital.
The Peninsula
