Background

Maternal mortality remains high, despite all the advances and efforts that have occurred in recent years and is directly related to the quality of care provided during pregnancy, childbirth, and in the puerperium.

Purpose

Identify the possible nursing diagnoses of mothers of newborns admitted to neonatal intensive care in the prepartum period, childbirth, and the puerperium.

Methods

Observational, cross-sectional study carried out by analyzing the medical records of mothers of newborns who required hospitalization in neonatal intensive care and determining the diagnoses through a process of diagnostic inference, based on NANDA-I Taxonomy, during the period from 2007 to 2016.

Findings

After reviewing the medical records of 272 mothers, a total of 3,843 observations were identified, distributed in 42 diagnoses, with Excessive fluid volume presenting the greatest predictive power over the outcome variable. The second group of more predictive variables comprised the Risk of vascular trauma, Risk of infection, Impaired parenthood, and Risk of body temperature imbalance. The third group, in turn, consisted of the following diagnoses: Insomnia, Pain during labor, Risk of impaired bonding, Acute pain, and Ineffective Breastfeeding.

Conclusions

The present study enabled the identification of the most frequent NANDA-I nursing diagnoses occurring during the prepartum period, childbirth, and the immediate puerperium of mothers of newborns admitted to neonatal intensive care, as well as those of greatest importance. Based on the encountered diagnoses, it can be concluded that future studies should be carried out in order for validation.

Implications

The knowledge of these diagnoses can contribute to the instrumentalization of nursing professionals, with consequent improvements in the nursing process and the provided assistance, aiming to assist in the reduction of maternal morbidity and mortality.