The Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust (RWT) has been granted nearly £1 million to lead a nationwide research project that could improve the lives of premature babies in the country.
The grant from the Department for Health and the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) is the largest ever given to the Trust and the biggest for neo-natal health service delivery research in the West Midlands.
The study, called OPTI-PREM, aims to improve neonatal service delivery for babies born between 27 and 31 weeks of gestation in England, by providing evidence-based data for the development of national policy, on the best place of care for these babies.
This £924,468.76 study is supported by the neonatal advisory body within the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, the British Association of Perinatal Medicine (BAPM), the Neonatal Clinical Reference Group (CRG) and the UK parent support group and charity for sick and preterm babies (BLISS).
RWT is leading the study, working with partners from BLISS, University of Oxford, University of Leicester, Imperial College London and the Neo Natal Data Analysis Unit. The Clinical lead Neonatologist for RWT, Tilly Pillay, is its chief investigator.
She said: “Currently babies born between 27 to 31 weeks of gestation may be managed in either a Neonatal Intensive care unit (NICU) or a Local Neonatal Unit (LNU). There are 77 LNUs and 44 NICUs in England. The decision on where individual babies are born is based on mother’s choice at booking, presentation to the nearest hospital and cot capacity at the time of delivery.
“Significant new evidence shows that care in a NICU, as opposed to a LNU, has benefit in terms of improved survival to discharge for those born at <26 weeks gestation; this is shaping policy for this group in England. In contrast, there is little evidence to guide care of the larger number of babies born between 27 and 31 weeks of gestation.
“It is possible that the bigger babies in this cohort, may benefit from being cared in a LNU while the smaller of the group, in a NICU. Our research will determine which environment offers the best clinical outcomes for babies at each gestational age in this group, and will take into account parent and staff perspectives on best place of care.”
The study began on 1 April this year and ends in 2020. It will analyse data on approximately 24,000 babies born prematurely between 27 and 31 weeks gestation in England between 2014 and 2018. It will conclude with recommendations which are to be developed with the country’s perinatal advisory body BAPM on where best these babies should be born and cared for in the future.
