Needs of premature newborns parents perceived by mothers and fathers

The aim of the study was to analyze the needs of premature newborns parents in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU), perceived by mothers and fathers. The study was conducted in Kaunas Perinatal Center at Kaunas Medical University Hospital NICU. Data was collected 18 months. The NICU Family Needs Inventory was used for data collection. Research sample includes mothers and fathers who had premature newborns hospitalized at the NICU. The sample consisted of 181 parents: 141 (77.9 %) mother and 40 (22.1 %) fathers. Conclusions. The needs identified by mothers and fathers depending on importance of subscales were ranked as follows: assurance, proximity/information, support, comfort. A comparison of how mothers and fathers assess their needs in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit according to the separate needs in every subscale has shown that: 1. The majority of statistically significant difference has been found in case of the assessment of support needs (33.3 %). Two thirds of mothers of premature newborns and one third of fathers have indicated these needs as being more important. 2. The assessment of assurance (8.3 %) and proximity (12.5 %) needs shows the lowest number of differences. The assurance need of being recognized as important to the newborn’s recovery and the proximity need of being able to hold the newborn and hold against the skin were assessed as being more important for mothers than for fathers