Welcome to NICU Notes. In addition to information and resources that can help guide nursing practice in the neonatal intensive care unit, NICU Notes are laced with personal knowledge gained through 12 years of experience in the NICU. It is hoped that they will serve as refreshers for experienced nurses and as learning tools for new nurses. NICU Notes are in no way meant to serve as a complete resource for neonatal nursing care but they do offer vignettes on specific NICU topics as well as NICU Cheat Sheets, a collection of information commonly referenced by NICU nurses such as arterial blood gas results, Apgar scoring and NRP review, and Early Days of a Micropremie, one interpretation of what one of the sickest and smallest of our patients might tell us about his experience if he could. NICU Notes has been written with the nursing perspective in mind.

It is worthy to note that neonatal intensive care is an area that is constantly progressing and changing, and, additionally, policies and standards can differ amongst institutions and individual neonatalogists. Nursing practice can be flavored not only by these but by the culture of the unit the nurse works in. This dortoms' author was fortunate to have gained much of her experience in a unit that focused on developmental and family-oriented care enhanced by a collaborative relationship between medical and nursing staff members. Good neonatalogists have much information to share with nurses that can be used to enhance understanding and diligence in their practice. Good NICU nurses have intimate insights into the status of their patients by means of the time they have to observe and interact with them. Combine knowledge and insight, add in an understanding of the developmental needs of the smallest and sickest of our young patients and their families, combine it with a motivation to advocate for and act upon those needs, and you have the best of holistic NICU care. This is what NICU nurses should strive for.

At the time of posting this information efforts have been made to ensure that information is up-to-date and accurate by not only relying on experience but also using established resources, however, please check out our obligatory Site Terms/Disclaimer if you decide to use these pages. Many of the resources used as well as handy websites for NICU nurses are listed under Links & Resources.

Any comments or questions regarding dortoms NICU Notes may be sent to nicunurse@dortoms.com.