Car seat challenge

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Hi Everybody,

Okay so I had my yearly review and my boss asked my what my plans for the unit next year and I couldn't think of anything so I said, "how about a corificeat challenge" because of course I had just read somebody talking about one on here. So now I need help. What all do you do for your corificeat challenges?

Do you have parents bring in their corificeats or do you have some in your units? What happens if they fail the challenge?

Thanks

Tina

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Specializes in Neonatal ICU (Cardiothoracic).

Our car seat tests consist of parents bringing in the car seat the baby will be going home in, and strapping him in for an hour on monitors. No bradys, desats, and the kid passes. If not, we retest, and if he fails again, he goes home in a flat car seat.

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Specializes in NICU.
Our car seat tests consist of parents bringing in the car seat the baby will be going home in, and strapping him in for an hour on monitors. No bradys, desats, and the kid passes. If not, we retest, and if he fails again, he goes home in a flat car seat.

We do the exact same thing, usually putting them in the corificeat right after they eat, since that's the most likely time for them to reflux / have an A/B episode...

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Specializes in NICU, Psych, Education.

Interesting! I'm not sure we've ever sent a kid home in a flat car seat. The vast majority of ours do pass by the second try though.

We record the time of the last feeding, but I don't think our guidelines specify whether it has to be after a feed or not.

Having the parents bring in the car seat themselves allows us to verify that they have one, that it has five-point restraints, and that the baby fits.

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Our car seat tests consist of parents bringing in the car seat the baby will be going home in, and strapping him in for an hour on monitors. No bradys, desats, and the kid passes. If not, we retest, and if he fails again, he goes home in a flat car seat.

Ditto. But we wait an hour after a feed. I think I've sent home one baby in a car bed and that was a long time ago.

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thank you everybody for your input so far. One question, do you supply the carbed or make the parents buy them?

thanks again

Tina

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Specializes in Nephrology, Cardiology, ER, ICU.

Okay, I just gotta ask: what's a carbed? How does it attach securely to the car? Is its only use for preemies or babies with issues?

Thanks for the info.

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Specializes in NICU.

BU%20preemie%20car%20seat%20angel%20guard.jpg

I think I've only seen us have to send one kid home in a car bed since I've been working there. Usually they pass the second time around. They get used when the baby can't tolerate being in the sitting up position that is needed for the regular car seats.

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Specializes in Nephrology, Cardiology, ER, ICU.

Thanks much for the pic - have never seen one...

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Specializes in NICU.

Our car beds will fit a baby up to 9 lbs, but it would be a squeeze. We rent the beds to the parents, usually they are only needed for a couple of weeks.

We have only found one car seat that had a recall, but was OK without the base. I think the parents replaced it.

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Specializes in Neonatal ICU (Cardiothoracic).

I've only seen one baby fail and have to use the car bed. I think we ordered it for the parents. I agree that having the parents bring in the car seat allows us to assess the parents ability to secure the baby, as well as the age of the car seat. I've seen some dinosaur seats come in..... you wonder if the parents used these as babies sometimes!

The car beds tend to be a little small. The one kid we sent home was a 6 month-old chronic, and he BARELY fit in the seat...

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Specializes in NICU.

All our preemies have to go for a car seat exam prior to discharge. If at all possible, we try to have the parents bring in the car seat, but the hospital has one in case parents are unable to bring theirs in before the test. Our apnea department does all the exams. The examiner tests the corificeat for fit, and it's fairly common for them to tell parents the corificeat is too old or too big for the baby. It's fairly frequent that kids fail their first test, especially some of the micro-preemies with chronic lung and a significant history of spells. They usually wait a week at least, and most kids pass the second time. But in my year here, I have definitely seen kids go home in carbeds. Sometimes it's the SGA kids who are mature enough to go home but too small to be safe in a regular corificeat.

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