Question about the NICU

pinotgirl · April 2012

Hi! I'm still pregnant but it's looking like I'll be delivering within the next week or so.

I was just curious about the NICU... what's the visitor policy there? I'm sure every NICU is different, but I was curious what your experiences were. I know DH and I can probably go at any time, but what about grandparents? My mom is all freaked out that she won't see her grandson until he's out of the hospital! That's really the least of our problems right now, but I'm trying to humor her by finding out if she can visit.

vsalt31 · April 2012

Wow, good luck to you!
I'm sure every hospital is different, but mine had 24/7 parent visitation. Any guests must be accompanied by at least 1 parent. And, there could be only total of 4 visitors in the room at anytime (4 included at least 1 parent). Children under 13 were not allowed, unless it's a sibling, then it was under strict supervision. No food or drinks. And, make sure everyone washes their hands when they enter & when they leave every time.
Wishing you the best.

jbeck78 · April 2012

vsalt31:

Wow, good luck to you!
I'm sure every hospital is different, but mine had 24/7 parent visitation. Any guests must be accompanied by at least 1 parent. And, there could be only total of 4 visitors in the room at anytime (4 included at least 1 parent). Children under 13 were not allowed, unless it's a sibling, then it was under strict supervision. No food or drinks. And, make sure everyone washes their hands when they enter & when they leave every time.
Wishing you the best.

My hospital rules are the same except only two people total, one of them being a parent at all times. Although we can designate a couple people to get a wrist band and they can have visiting rights without us, but they are not allowed to get any info on the baby, just visit.

Irishsapphire · April 2012

Our NICU policy was that that one parent could accompany one additional person into the room. So if we had everyone there, we had to take one person at a time. And I would take one person. And my husband would take the next person. It was better when my son was home, and we could all be in the same room with baby.

pinotgirl · April 2012

Thanks! That's kinda what I was thinking. I didn't necessarily want people in there at all hours, but at the same time it's good that they can come with me/DH so they can see for themselves.

I'm sure I'll be on this board a lot soon... I already lurk here, and I appreciate all your stories and words of wisdom!

jacque_z · April 2012

vsalt31:

Wow, good luck to you!
I'm sure every hospital is different, but mine had 24/7 parent visitation. Any guests must be accompanied by at least 1 parent. And, there could be only total of 4 visitors in the room at anytime (4 included at least 1 parent). Children under 13 were not allowed, unless it's a sibling, then it was under strict supervision. No food or drinks. And, make sure everyone washes their hands when they enter & when they leave every time.
Wishing you the best.

Our NICU rules were very similar to this except that we could add 4 people to a list and those 4 could visit anytime they wanted without a parent. We added our parents to that list. It was nice that they could come and go without us.

AlwaysSunny925 · April 2012

Our was that parents can visit 24/7. Grandparents could visit anytime on their own. Other visitors needed to be accompanied by us. Only two people at the bed side at a time. No children.

iristony · April 2012

Ours was same- only 2 visitors at a time. Grandparents were put on list and allowed to come solo without us. Thank God! My MIL went over everyday for one or two of the feeding/change times and it was a huge relief. I had to go back to work so I could take off when son came home and I would go before work, at lunch and after work and she would either do the 9 am or 3 pm feeding. I did get special permission to sneak my 4 year old niece in to see my son one time, but typically it was no kids unless they were siblings.

Mrs. Alice · April 2012

1st NICU: parents 24/7 even during shift change, grandparents 24/7 except during shift change, children over 2 (I think) could visit during between April - Oct as long as they were checked off by the charge nurse first to make sure they weren't actively ill. I loved their policy because they actually let parents purchase badges for $5 that let us have access in and out any time we wanted, no getting buzzed in, signing in or anything, plus it let us get in and out of the parking garage for free. I don't remember the limit of visitors at bedside, but I guess since we had 2 babies we could have more at a time.

2nd NICU: We had a private room. Parents and grandparents 24/7, we could assign a certain number of people of which could come visit the babies at any time without us accompanying them. We had to get buzzed in and sign in and out and get a visitor pass each time.

AlwaysSunny925 · April 2012

iristony:
Ours was same- only 2 visitors at a time. Grandparents were put on list and allowed to come solo without us. Thank God! My MIL went over everyday for one or two of the feeding/change times and it was a huge relief. I had to go back to work so I could take off when son came home and I would go before work, at lunch and after work and she would either do the 9 am or 3 pm feeding. I did get special permission to sneak my 4 year old niece in to see my son one time, but typically it was no kids unless they were siblings.

My mother would go every day too. It was so nice to know that they would get visitors more often than just when we were able to go. Especially once Ryan was home, DH was back at work, and we couldn't make it there a often for Aiden. My mom really saved the day.

kitkat145 · April 2012

Me and DH could visit anytime except 7-8 am and pm for shift changes. We had two visitor passes which had to be used with one of us present.

crystaleyes39 · April 2012

Good luck to you and I wish you a healthy delivery for you and for baby! The NICU for us was a 24/7 parent visitation. As far as guests anyone could come, but it was only 1 visitor per bed side...and My husband or I had to be there with them. A lot of times we would rotate people from the waiting room. We were very paranoid about letting too many people aside from our close friends and family come to visit until they were out though. And anyone who is sick, including yourself...you should avoid visiting.

pinksandbermuda · April 2012

this was our policy too. Best of luck to you and I hope your stay is short and uneventful!

lwmooney87 · April 2012

Our NICU had a 3 person rule. Only people to see baby at a time. We were able to see DD any time except for shift changes. I think it was 7 til 7:30 am and pm. Grandparents were allowed in the NICU even if the parents weren't there. DH and I didn't like that so we signed a paper and they put it BIG on the front of DD's chart that NO ONE was allowed without us.

I had a bad experience with my MIL while I was in the hospital after my c-section. She came to see DD in the NICU and I wasn't feeling well and DH had gone back to work and I asked her politely to come back later and I would take her to see her. She said "Ok that's perfectly fine" and told me to rest and then left" Well, I found out later (from one of the nurses) that she told one of the nurses that I had given her permission to see DD and they let her in! (It was someone she knew personally anyway) I let them know that it was NOT acceptable for her to do that. DH and I both agreed we didn't want too many people stimulating her. While she was in the NICU no one was allowed to hold her but us. We thought of it as our time to be selfish if we wanted to. To this day, she still hasn't come clean about the fact that she did that. It really ticked me off.

ANYWAY lol sorry for the rant. In a nutshell, every NICU is different. They should give you a notebook with their policies, forms to fill out, etc. Good luck! I hope you don't have to deliver early but if you do, this board great support!

kelkel09 · April 2012

IrishSapphire:
Our NICU policy was that that one parent could accompany one additional person into the room. So if we had everyone there, we had to take one person at a time. And I would take one person. And my husband would take the next person. It was better when my son was home, and we could all be in the same room with baby.

our hospital had the same policy. I also wanted to add that we did have the option of adding ppl to a list so they could come visit witout us (i.e. grandparents). We never felt comfortable with people being there without us so we didnt do it, but just wanted to let you know so you can ask about it it's something you would want to do.

sweetsugarmama · April 2012

ours sounds so strict compared to all of yours! parents can come anytime except between 6:30-8 am/pm daily for shift change and updates. We can call anytime of course. You can have 4 people on a list per baby, those are the only 4 who can visit the baby (you can't keep changing the list to rotate people). Since we have two babies we technically get 8 but we only have 4 family adults around and I'm not adding friends to the list-it's just easier to say no to everyone but family. No one under 18, not even siblings. Everyone must do the 2 minute scrub to enter and wear the robes.

They do have a viewing window, but being in incubators DD can't see much.

Pips09 · April 2012

Our NICU was pretty strict. The parents could visit 24/7 except for 6:30-7 am/pm during shift change. A parent could bring up to 2 visitors in at a time, but only 3 people total at any time could be there. No children, and no visitors without a parent (even if I had to go to the restroom, my visitors had to leave with me).

Good luck with your baby!

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