What practice can help prevent misidentification of newborns?

The practice that can help prevent misidentification of newborns through standardized naming systems involving the mother's and newborn's gender focuses on creating a systematic approach to naming that reduces the likelihood of confusion. By using clear identifiers based on both the mother's and the newborn's gender, healthcare providers can significantly enhance the accuracy of patient identification, making it easier to prevent errors in care or treatment.

Standardized naming systems help ensure that each name is distinctive enough to minimize overlaps, which can occur in hospitals where multiple children might have similar names. This practice complements other identification strategies and aligns with patient safety goals related to accurate patient identification, therefore directly addressing the crucial need to prevent errors associated with newborn misidentification.

Other options, while they may seem to hold potential for reducing misidentification, do not provide the same level of clarity or systemic organization as the standardized naming system does. Factors such as common initials may lead to confusion, assigning unique identification numbers still relies on accurate data entry and could be overlooked or mismanaged, and physical descriptions can be subjective and vary from person to person, introducing the risk of human error. Thus, utilizing the names linked with maternal and newborn gender offers a structured approach that contributes to heightened safety in the identification of newborns.