Providing parents in a neonatal intensive care unit with audiorecordings of their conversation with neonatologists: a randomised trial.

Abstract Objective To determine whether giving mothers in Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) audiorecordings of their conversations with neonatologists improved maternal recall of information and psychological wellbeing. Design: Randomised, clinician - blinded trial with mothers in a NICU either receiving or not receiving audiotapes of their conversations with neonatologists. Participants 200 mothers of babies in a tertiary NICU in North Queensland, Australia Null hypothesis: Providing mothers with an audiotaping of their conversation with neonatologists does not improvetheir recall of infromation about their babies nor the parental well being. Outcome measures: Outcomes (at ten days, four months and 12 months) included recall of information, attitudes towards and use of the audiotape, satisfaction with conversations, post natal depression, parental anxiety, general health and parenting stress. The information conveyed by the neonatologists was coded from transcripts of the audiotapes and matched against the mothers’ recall of the information as measured by interview. All analyses were by intention to treat.