Nursery Intensive Care Unit
St. Joseph's is home to a Level III Perinatal Center and a Nursery Intensive Care Unit (NICU), one of only a few in Arizona.
St. Joseph's NICU cares for newborn infants throughout the Southwest and serve as the first home for nearly 800 premature babies each year. Our perinatologists are specialists who care for both mother and fetus in complicated pregnancies, either as the primary caregiver, or in partnership with your primary obstetrician or midwife. We collaborate with a wide variety of specialists to provide the best possible outcome for you and your baby.
Because infants in the NICU often have complicated and serious respiratory issues, the unit is outfitted with some of the most advanced life-saving equipment. Its state-of-the-art technology includes Extra Corporeal Membrane Oxygenation (ECMO), a heart-lung bypass machine that works for an infant's heart and/or lungs while the baby's organs develop.
To ease the transition from hospital to home, the unit offers a parent room where parents and their babies can stay for 24 to 48 hours before being discharged. During that time, nurses assume a secondary role in which they help parents learn to care for their baby, administer medications, and become comfortable as their baby's primary caregiver.
The following conditions are the primary reasons babies receive treatment in the NICU:
Our unit is proud to become one of 12 NIDCAP (Newborn Individualized Developmental Care and Assessment Program) Training Centers in the world. Our exceptional care and experience brings us to the forefront of the care for premature infants. Learn more about our NIDCAP training center.
