Design and assessment of an intervention for parents of premature newborns: a mixed-methods study

Abstract

Objective: to design and assess an intervention targeted at reinforcing parents’ competency in caring for premature newborns. Method: a mixed-methods, exploratory and sequential intervention study. A grounded theory was applied in the first phase. The participants were 12 mothers and 4 fathers. A randomized pilot study was implemented in the second phase, with 14 mothers in each group. The main response variable was “care competency”. The CUIDAR Ma-Pre scale was applied in the baseline and follow-up measurements. Results: four categories emerged: Facing premature births, Experiencing the prematurity routine in Neonatal Units, Self-empowerment to care for premature newborns, and Caring for premature newborns at home. Self-empowerment to care for premature newborns was the central category. These results were integrated into the intervention design. Differences in favor of the intervention were found in the assessment. Although these differences were not statistically significant between the groups, it were in fact so intra-group (Control n=13 baseline 82.15; at discharge 117.08 p=0.000 vs Intervention n=14 baseline 80.71; at discharge 121.14 p=0.000). Conclusion: empowerment was essential in the experience; an intervention with this approach is relevant, and its preliminary assessment suggests that it can improve care competency. It is pertinent to conduct a study at a larger scale. ClinicalTrials.gov. Identifier: NCT05005988.