Baby with jaundice at clinical

[JA27]

On my first maternity and child clinical I worked with a little boy with jaundice. Which of the NANDA diagnosis would fit with this? Could you please help me with suggestions for interventions? I guess the goal would be to reduce the billirubin level to one low enough to be discharged(?). It was 10.9 when discharged. Any comments are greatly appreciated!!

[Daytonite, BSN, RN]

What are the symptoms of the elevated bilirubin levels? That is how you determine the nursing problem. The skin is discolored and the baby is placed under bili-light. So, the problem is one of potential injury to the skin. Therefore, your patient's problem is Risk for Injury (due to side effects of the phototherapy) R/T therapeutic intervention. The reason I put "side effects of phototherapy" in parentheses is because when you write the nursing interventions and goals/outcomes for this nursing diagnosis, you will focus on monitoring for and preventing those side effects. I do not mean for you to include those words in your actual nursing diagnostic statement. However, when you write any "Risk for" nursing diagnosis, it must have a specific target risk. In this case, the specific target risk would be the side effects of the phototherapy. The actual nursing diagnosis you would use is: Risk for Injury R/T therapeutic intervention.