Changing Nappy- How often?

It's not daft at all- I'm smiling at the 'nappies'! Here in the states they're 'diapers'. I feel every six is fine if indeed it is a minimal handling baby. Why? Because disposable nappies/ diapers keep the skin relatively dry. Unless the little one had a nappie/ diaper full of stool, i'd let them be.

BUT if you're picking them up to feed anyway- I'd change every three hours.

We change ours with every feed. The sick kids we do with hands on care unless they have a sore butt, then we change more often.

We always change diapers with every set of cares. Cares are either q 3, 4 or 6 hours for a sick baby we don't want to touch too often.

With Cares , mostly every 3hr

Ideally, all of our babies are a Q3 feed/diaper change/vitals schedule, but of course you have differences...in those who are on minimal stimulation for any reason, we would do every 6 hour diaper changes.

Lmbo! I was like what's a nappy? Am I new?

Aww its funny how you call them diapers. I'll have to say that as a joke to one of the nurses and she what she does. I have no idea where nappy came from but it does sound cute!

Come over to the UK and you will learn a whole different language!

Come over to the UK and you will learn a whole different language!

I described myself to a British friend as spunky, and thoroughly grossed him out.

We change them with every set of care/feeding. In your example, yes we would change them every 3 hours for all 4 kids.

My question is how do you feed 4 babies on a 3 hr schedule and have time to chart a darn thing? Our unit only allows 3/1 ratio. I'm moving to a new unit soon and I'm scared to death that it might mean a huge workload increase. Between baths, cares, bed changes, feedings and parents (for a maximum of 3 pts. Or 1-2 depending on acuity.) I feel swamped half the time already.

My question is how do you feed 4 babies on a 3 hr schedule and have time to chart a darn thing?

Excellent question. Every now and then you just don't. It sucks. If you have four babies who all take half an hour to eat and eat every three hours -- that's eight hours of a 12 hour shift just feeding kids. Doesn't account for assessments, cares, meds, baths, weights, labs, parent education, stocking supplies, attending deliveries, phone calls, charting... Our babies and families end up losing out. Luckily we usually have a mix of kids with gavage tubes on the intermediate nursery side; on the NICU side there's also the NPO babies, IV fluids, and those who are gavage only.

To answer the question, our babies are on q3 or q4 hour schedules, so we change that often at a minimum. More often as needed if the kiddo can tolerate the stimulation.