The Effect of Empowerment Program on Maternal Discharge Preparation and Neonatal Length of Hospital Stay: A Randomized Controlled Trial

BACKGROUND: Despite the increased survival of premature infants, many infants are discharged from the hospital while they still require care and follow-up. The present study aimed to determine the effect of empowerment program on maternal discharge preparation and infants' length of hospital stay. MATERIALS AND METHODS: In this pretest-posttest clinical trial, 60 premature infants along with their mothers were selected from the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) of a teaching hospital in Kermanshah in 2016 via convenience sampling and were allocated to experimental and control groups. Mothers in the control group performed routine care and those in experimental group, in addition to the routine care, performed an intervention program, training sessions including touching and massage, bathing, infection prevention, warning signs, and neonatal resuscitation. Data were collected by a maternal and neonatal demographic questionnaire and a discharge preparation checklist, performed twice (at admission and before discharge), by the researcher. The collected data were analyzed by independent and paired t-test. RESULTS: The mean (standard deviation) of the total score of maternal discharge preparation in intervention group 44.65 (3.90) was significantly higher than that of the control group 33.00 (8.28) (t = -6.58, p <0.001). The mean length of neonatal hospitalization in the intervention group (14.79 days) was significantly shorter than that of the control group (20.43 days) (p = 0.020). CONCLUSIONS: The increasing maternal discharge readiness and reducing the length of neonatal hospital stay would decrease the medical costs and supply more beds for admission of other infants.