NICU stands for newborn intensive care unit. This is a nursery in a hospital that provides around-the-clock care to sick or premature babies. It has health care providers who have special training and equipment to give your baby the best possible care.
Let us understand the types of NICU and reasons why babies require NICU.
NICU has three levels
Intensive care NICU
Moderate level NICU
Basic treatment NICU
In India, 15% of babies are born premature, which means that before 40 weeks, these babies are kept in level 3 NICU for extra care.
Reasons Why Your Baby Might Require NICU
· Low Birth Weight
Along with this, babies who weigh less than 2.5 kg or especially 1.8 kg are also kept in level 3 NICU.
For every 100 babies born in India, 10 %of the babies require NICU, for which we should be mentally prepared. The smaller the baby, the more days it takes.
Premature babies which weigh around 1.5kg, 1200grms or 1kg, require 1 or 1.5 months in NICU. The less the weight, the more time the baby requires to be in the NICU. Nowadays, in India, a child of 500 grams can be survived. But the survival rate of 500-700grams weighing babies is 40-80%. Baby weighing 700 grams- to 1kg is around 70-80%.
Baby weighing more than 1kg has chances of survival of 75-85% if taken care in NICU which has all the facilities. Babies weighing 1.5 and above have survival chances of 95% and above for premature babies.
· Respiratory Distress
The second common problem is difficulty in breathing in newborn babies which require NICU assistance. In India out of 100 newborn babies 10 do not cry at the time of the birth, which means there is a low supply of oxygen in the body, indirectly means less supply of oxygen in brain lungs and heart. When there is low supply of oxygen, babies organs get affected and these babies are classified under Hypoxic Ischemic Baby. These babies required to be in NICU.
· Infections
The third problem is babies suffering from an infection. Out of 100 babies in NICU 25% of babies are suffering from the infection.
· Jaundice
The fourth reason why babies require NICU is because of the Jaundice, also the babies who are suffering from respiratory problems require to be in NICU for 10-15 days. Babies suffering from jaundice take around 10- 3 weeks of NICU treatment.
When a baby is admitted in NICU. they require some duration to recover and with advanced medical technology and knowledge, the survival rate has increased.
Therefore it’s important to choose the right NICU in order to get the required treatment.
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