The care by parent unit. A tool for decreasing anxiety in mothers of high risk infants.

The delivery of a premature infant, especially one of very low birth weight, represents a crisis for a family. Bidder et al. have determined through a series of interviews that mothers of preterm infants are anxious at two particular points in their infant's neonatal course: the time of birth and the time of discharge. The Care By Parent Unit (CBPU) was developed at Hermann Hospital in Houston, Texas, to provide a transition from the specialized care of the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) to home and to aid the parents in viewing their infant as a normal, "safe" child to take home. To evaluate the impact of a CBPU on maternal anxiety, the mothers' responses before and after the CBPU experience were evaluated.