Educational priorities in the newborn nursery

The newborn nursery provides an ideal setting for introducing basic concepts in primary care. The incorporation of the newborn (low risk) nursery as a component of a division of ambulatory and community pediatrics presents an opportunity to address many of these issues and provides a focus for mother-child and family-institution bonding. In the University of California, Irvine, Medical Center nursery, management plans of residents and medical students are reviewed by a multidisciplinary team. The team considers the many physiologic adjustments a newborn infant must undergo to adapt successfully to its environment and discusses the impact of psychosocial stress, economic conditions, citizenship status, and environmental concerns on the ability of the parents to provide a supportive environment for their infant. Supervision of direct patient care and administrative responsibility for medical decisions in the nursery are the duties of the child health associate assigned to the nursery and his supervising physician.