Authors
Isabel Cuéllar-Flores, Gloria Alonso-Toribio, María José Rodríguez Castaño
Published in
SAGE open nursing. Volume 12. Pages 23779608261453172. Epub Jul 23, 2026.
Abstract
Parental experience in neonatal intensive care units strongly impacts family satisfaction and emotional well-being.
This study explored associations between parental neonatal intensive care unit experience, sociodemographic and hospitalization factors, and anxiety-depressive symptoms.
A cross-sectional study was conducted with 84 parents of neonatal intensive care unit-admitted infants. Measures included parental experience (EMPATHIC-N), satisfaction with professionals, and anxiety-depressive symptoms (PHQ-4), along with sociodemographic and hospitalization data. Analyses comprised descriptive statistics, group comparisons, correlations, and mediation modeling.
Participants were mainly highly educated European mothers. Most infants stayed <1 week; parental participation occurred 1day-6 months post-discharge. Families reported high willingness to return (77.1%) and recommend the neonatal intensive care unit (79.5%). Satisfaction with nurses and physicians was high (8.3/10), though four EMPATHIC-N items scored below 75%. Anxiety-depressive symptoms were present in 24.4%, inversely correlating with satisfaction and some specific EMPATHIC-N items. Mediation analysis showed healthcare team satisfaction explained 70% of the effect of parental experience on anxiety-depressive symptoms.
Satisfaction with the healthcare team plays a central role in the emotional distress of parents after their experience in the neonatal intensive care unit, so improving care initiatives that enhance it could reduce anxiety and depression in parents.
PMID:
42500499
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 25 Jul 2026.
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