International Perspectives

Abstract

Teamwork is an important aspect of all fields of human knowledge, including health-related activities. Networking is a form of cooperation that can enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of any project by collaboration toward common goals. New Internet-based information and communication technologies increase opportunities for collaboration among scientists and clinicians. In the medical field, networking has been used to improve the quality of health care by disseminating information on evidence-based effective and ineffective or dangerous interventions (eg, through the Cochrane Collaboration) and promoting high-quality clinical research. Neonatal networking can be defined as collaborative work involving several neonatal intensive care units (NICUs) sharing a common protocol aimed to collect standardized patient data for external audits (benchmarking), clinical trials, and quality of care improvement projects. The first example of successful neonatal networking appeared in 1953, when the National Institutes of Health sponsored a clinical trial of the restriction of supplemental oxygen delivery to very low-birthweight (VLBW) infants. It was performed in 18 NICUs and resulted in a sharp decline in the incidence of retinopathy of prematurity leading to blindness. (1) Since then, a large number of sufficiently sized, well-designed, randomized clinical trials have been conducted and published, exerting a strong impact on neonatal care throughout the world. (2) Other neonatal networks have been established as stable, ongoing organizations that have wider missions, not only to perform high-quality clinical research but to promote excellence in clinical practice by the use of standardized comparisons of outcomes, teaching and training of health personnel involved in neonatal care, and setting of high standards for the care of preterm infants. Such networks are supported by public funds (eg, the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development [NICHD] Neonatal Network (3) and the Australian and New Zealand Neonatal Network \[ANZNN\] (4)), membership fees (eg, the Vermont-Oxford Network …