Neonatal abstinence syndrome: Effectiveness of targeted umbilical cord drug screening

Objective: This study sought to determine if targeted drug screening of newborns was effective in identifying a positive drug test result. Study design: This was a retrospective cross-sectional study. A total of 340 infants met criteria for drug screening. Sensitivity and specificity were used to evaluate each of the potential risk factors in terms of their ability to predict a positive drug test result. Two-sample t-tests were used to compare differences in Finnegan scores between babies with a positive drug test result and those with a negative one. Result: The risk factor with the highest sensitivity was maternal history of drug use. The difference in the Finnegan scores between groups was statistically significant. Conclusion: The risk factors associated with this study were not very sensitive. The only way to identify all infants at risk of NAS is to standardize the screening process and apply to all infants.