Providing clarity around ethical discussion: development of a neonatal intervention score

Abstract

Aim: To develop a Neonatal Intervention Score (NIS) to describe the clinical trajectory of a neonate throughout their neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) admission. Methods: The NIS was developed by modifying the Neonatal Therapeutic Intervention Scoring System (NTISS) to reflect illness severity, dependency on life-sustaining interventions and overall life trajectory on a longitudinal basis, rather than illness burden. Validity for longitudinal use within the NICU was tested by calculating the score for 99 preterm babies born less than 28 weeks at predetermined time points throughout their admission to tertiary level care at two institutions. Results: A total of 1333 NISs were analysed, ran..