AWHONN Convention
 

Sessions

A Certified Staff NICU Infant Massage Therapy Program: A Shared Governance Initiative

Sunday, June 12, 2016

Title: A Certified Staff NICU Infant Massage Therapy Program: A Shared Governance Initiative

Longhorn Hall D (Gaylord Grapevine)
Rebecca J. Bell, MSN, RN , NICU, Maricopa Integrated Health Services, Phoenix, AZ
LeAnn Hardin, RN, MSN, C-EFM , Maricopa Integrated Health Services, Phoenix, AZ

Discipline: Neonatal (N)

Learning Objectives:
  • Identify strategies to design an inexpensive, innovative massage therapy program into an NICU.
  • Discuss ways to utilize a shared governance model in the implementation of evidence-based practice into a large nursing unit.
  • Outline quality indicators that can be used to measure the success of a massage therapy program in the NICU.

    • Submission Description:
    The NICU Shared Governance Team implemented an innovative, inexpensive, impactful, massage therapy program primarily using the Vimala, Listening Touch, and M techniques as well as therapeutic touch. The team looked to nursing evidence for a way to improve NICU patients’ quality of life. The literature identified massage therapy as a means to decrease infants’ response to pain, as well as improve their physiological stability, elimination pattern, weight gain and sleep.

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