Rooming-in is best described as which practice?

Rooming-in is best described as which practice?

• A. Separate nursery.
• B. Keeping healthy newborns with mothers in the post-labor recovery room to enhance parent-infant bonding.
• C. Early discharge.
• D. Bathing after birth.

Answer: (B)

Rooming-in means keeping the healthy newborn with the mother in the same room after birth, rather than sending the baby to a separate nursery. This arrangement allows continuous mother–baby contact, which supports immediate bonding and makes it easier for the mother to initiate and sustain breastfeeding because the baby can feed on demand and the mother learns feeding cues through close observation. It also helps staff monitor both mother and baby closely and can boost maternal confidence and reduce stress by avoiding separation. The other concepts involve different practices: having a separate nursery means the baby isn’t rooming in with the mother, which contradicts rooming-in; early discharge focuses on leaving the hospital sooner for the baby and mother, not on where they stay during the hospital stay; bathing after birth is about newborn care routines and is not about the rooming arrangement.

Rooming-in means keeping the healthy newborn with the mother in the same room after birth, rather than sending the baby to a separate nursery. This arrangement allows continuous mother–baby contact, which supports immediate bonding and makes it easier for the mother to initiate and sustain breastfeeding because the baby can feed on demand and the mother learns feeding cues through close observation. It also helps staff monitor both mother and baby closely and can boost maternal confidence and reduce stress by avoiding separation.

The other concepts involve different practices: having a separate nursery means the baby isn’t rooming in with the mother, which contradicts rooming-in; early discharge focuses on leaving the hospital sooner for the baby and mother, not on where they stay during the hospital stay; bathing after birth is about newborn care routines and is not about the rooming arrangement.