The effect of the prone and side lying position by using the positioning bed on the comfort of the preterm baby

The study was carried out experimentally to determine the effect of prone and side-lying position on the comfort of preterm infants using positioning bed in preterm infants hospitalized in Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU).The population of the study consisted of preterm babies hospitalized in Neonology Department of Pediatric Health and Diseases Department of Gaziantep University Şahinbey Research and Application Hospital between 01.12.2017 and 01.07.2018.Research data were collected by the Infant Information Form, Neonatal Position Assessment Tool (NPAT) and Premature Infant Comfort Scale (PICS) developed by the researcher. This study was carried out in two stages by giving the infants prone and side-lying position, respectively, in every 3 hours in the positioning bed.SPSS for Windows version 22.0 was used for statistical analysis of the data. Shapiro-Wilk test and nonparametric Wilcoxon signed rank test were used to determine PICS and NPAT scores and p <0.05 was considered statistically significant. In this study, it was determined that the mean PICS score in the prone position was 9.79±0.88, and the mean NPAT score in the prone position was 10.01±1.12. It was determined that these scores were more desired than the PICS score in the lateral position (10.01±1.01) and NPAT score in the lateral position (9.79±1.04). It was determined that the comfort of preterm babies increased in both positions as a result of PICS scores obtained at the pre-test (at the first minute of the position), 1st hour and 2nd hour. There was a significant difference between pre-test and first hour scores and between pre-test and second hour scores in NPAT scores of preterms in prone position (p <0.01). There was no significant difference between first hour and second hour scores. In addition, there was a significant difference between pre-test and first hour scores in the side-lying position of preterm with NPAT (p <0.05). However, the fact that there was no significant difference between the pre-test and the second hour and between the first and second hour shows that the baby had difficulty in maintaining the optimal / appropriate position at the end of the 1st hour in the side-lying position. In conclusion, it is thought that the position bed used affects comfort more than the baby's position in this study. For increasing the comfort of the preterm baby and support its development it is recommended to use a position bed when positioning the baby and that the position to be given is primarily prone position. Keywords: Preterm, Position, Positioning Bed, Comfort