Association between neonatal intensive care unit medication safety practices, adverse events, and death

Objective: Determine the associations between neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) medication safety practices, laboratory-based adverse events (lab-AEs), and death.

Study design: We combined data from a 2016 survey of Pediatrix NICUs on use of medication safety practices with 2014-2016 infant data. We grouped NICUs based on the number of safety practices used (≤5, 6-7, and 8-10) and evaluated the association between the number of safety practices used and lab-AEs and deaths using logistic regressions.

Results: Of the 94 NICUs included, 17% used ≤5 medication safety practices, 51% used 6-7, and 32% used 8-10. NICUs with more safety practices did not have a difference in lab-AEs or death.

Conclusion: In this cohort, the use of more medication safety practices was not associated with fewer lab-AEs or decreased death.