title: A free parking trial to increase visitation and improve extremely low birth weight infant outcomes.
abstract: Frequent parental visits are likely to benefit infants in a neonatal intensive care unit (NICU), particularly extremely low birth weight (ELBW; ⩽1000 g) survivors. Parking costs (⩾$10 per visit in our center) may deter visitation, especially for low-income parents. We assessed whether free parking (FP) decreased survivors' length of stay (LOS).
  
  
  
  Parents (N=138) of ELBW infants (7 to 14 days old) were randomized to usual care (UC; n=66) or FP (n=72). The primary outcome was LOS.
  
  
  
  Among survivors (n=116), LOS was not significantly less with FP than UC (means: FP=89, UC=102 days, P=0.22; medians: FP=82, UC=84 days, P=0.30). Groups did not differ significantly on proportion of visit days (FP=0.69, UC=0.72, P=0.47), parental involvement, knowledge/skills and satisfaction. Post hoc analyses found that parents with a greater income, a car and fewer children visited more.
  
  
  
  More potent interventions than FP are needed to increase parental visits and reduce LOS for ELBW infants in disadvantaged urban populations.
authors.affiliation: Department of Family and Community Medicine, The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth), McGovern Medical School, Houston, TX, USA.
authors.forename: T F
authors.initials: TF
authors.lastname: Northrup
authors.affiliation: Department of Pediatrics, UTHealth, McGovern Medical School, Houston, TX, USA.
authors.forename: P W
authors.initials: PW
authors.lastname: Evans
authors.affiliation: Department of Pediatrics, UTHealth, McGovern Medical School, Houston, TX, USA.
authors.forename: M L
authors.initials: ML
authors.lastname: Lillie
authors.affiliation: Department of Pediatrics, UTHealth, McGovern Medical School, Houston, TX, USA.
authors.forename: J E
authors.initials: JE
authors.lastname: Tyson
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D005249:Fees and Charges; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D052577:Infant, Extremely Low Birth Weight; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D007363:Intensive Care Units, Neonatal / Q000191:economics / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D007902:Length of Stay / Q000191:economics*; D008297:Male; D010290:Parents; D014789:Visitors to Patients / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*