Safe Sleep Education for the Prevention of Newborn Falls

Abstract

Incidents of newborn falls and drops are prevalent in the mother-baby care area, which illustrates a significant gap in care. National patient safety goals focus on eliminating the incidence of patient falls in the inpatient setting. This DNP project aimed to develop a standardized patient education tool using the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) safe sleep guidelines to decrease the risk of newborn falls in the mother-baby care setting. The project included an education session delivered to nurses and a patient education handout distributed to the parents of all newborns admitted to the mother-baby unit. Data collected included utilization of the handout, incidence of newborn falls, good catch events, and nurse feedback regarding the feasibility of the tool in practice. Over a 12-week implementation period, there were zero newborn falls. Good catch events were regularly reported, demonstrating that most events occurred while the newborn was in the mother’s bed. Given these findings, the primary recommendation for practice is to incorporate a standardized education tool to deliver safe sleep education to decrease the risk of newborn falls in the mother-baby care setting.