• An Exploration of Registered Nurses’ Experiences of and Attitudes Towards Providing Care to Infants with Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome and their Families.

Background: 60 to 90% of infants exposed to opioids in utero experience a constellation of postnatal withdrawal symptom, referred to as neonatal abstinence syndrome (Hahn et al. 2016). As the use of illicit substances has increased amongst women of childbearing age (Kumar & Garg 2019), these infants are increasingly presenting to the acute care setting. Thus, more nurses are caring for these infants and uniquely positioned to influence the parenting capacity of these infant’s parents.

Research Aim: The purpose of this literature review is to explore registered nurses’ experiences of and attitudes towards providing care to infants with neonatal abstinence syndrome and their families.

Search Strategy: Four electronic databases were systematically searched; Academic Search Complete, PubMed, CINAHL and Open Access Thesis and Dissertation. The keywords “nurse”, “experience” and “neonatal abstinence syndrome”, as wells as English language and peer reviewed limitations were incorporated into the search. Reference lists of relevant literature were manually searched. 16 research studies were selected for inclusion in this review of the literature.

Key Findings: Following thematic analysis and critical appraisal, three themes emerged; ”the complex needs of the parent-infant NAS dyad”, “perceived barriers and enablers to care”, and “emotional and moral distress”.

Conclusion: Nurses struggled to meet the demanding needs of this patient group amidst various external and internal constraints. The conflict of balancing competing care priorities, and navigating personal emotions resulted in the emergence of moral distress amongst nurses.

Recommendations: Results indicated the need for organisations to implement appropriate educational and supportive interventions to assist nurses caring for this patient cohort. However, in order to determine effective interventions, more research is required in this area of nursing.