Quality improvement approaches to reduce racial/ethnic disparities in the neonatal intensive care unit

Abstract

Inequities in neonatal care quality and outcomes persist. Current models of neonatal quality improvement (QI) typically involve implementation of standardized approaches to clinical care that seek to provide consistent care to all infants and their families, which may neglect to account for the unique needs of diverse patient populations. Current approaches often fail to track outcome and process measures by important social disparity metrics, such as race/ethnicity and primary language. Despite these shortcomings, use of a QI structure has tremendous potential to address disparities in neonatal care. Crucial components of a QI approach to achieve health equity include: (1) Identifying equity goals from the inception of a project; (2) Inclusion of diverse family members on multidisciplinary teams; (3) Tracking outcome and process measures according to disparity metrics; and (4) Conducting interventions that preferentially address barriers of high-risk social groups. Hospital-system commitment to diversity and inclusion in the healthcare work force, recognition of the impact of unconscious provider bias and advocacy in the greater public health setting are needed to address underlying social inequities that impact neonatal care quality.