Neonatal services: where are we now?

The seventh annual National Neonatal Audit Programme (NNAP) from the Royal College of Paediatricians and Child Health (RCPCH) published in October 2014, looked at care provided to babies admitted to neonatal units in England and Wales. Although it demonstrates improvement over a seven-year period, it also identified geographical variations in breastfeeding, temperature measurements within an hour of birth and the number of women at risk of preterm birth that were given antenatal steroids.

The report included data from all 179 English and Welsh neonatal units (NNU) open in 2013, comprising 91,232 completed episodes involving 80,000 babies discharged during the calendar year during 2013. 

Feeding and temperature data remains good, and data completeness for questions such as that concerning Retinopathy of Prematurity (ROP) is improved – 94% of eligible babies now have at least one ROP screen recorded, up from 79% in 2012. Data completeness for infection related questions, however, remains poor.