Reducing Stress, Anxiety, and Depression for NICU Parents

This project aims to appraise evidence of the effectiveness of various practices on reducing stress, anxiety, and depression among parents of infants in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). The project contains six research articles from both national and international journals. Study designs include one meta-analysis, one randomized controlled trial, one small scale randomized controlled trial, one prospective phase lag cohort study, on pretest-posttest study, and one mixed-methods pretest-posttest study. Recommendations for effective interventions were based on best evidence discovered through quality appraisal and study outcomes. All interventions, except for educational programs and Kangaroo Care, resulted in a statistically significant reduction of either stress, anxiety, and/ or depression. Family centered care and mindfulness-based intervention reduced all barriers of interest. There is strong and high-quality evidence for the effect of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy on depression, moderate evidence for the effect of activity-based group therapy on anxiety, and promising evidence for the effect of HUG Your Baby on stress