Modern NICU's have influenced to cause a decrease in perinatal and neonatal mortality and morbidity. Infants are now discharged home from the NICU with unresolved problems and ongoing illnesses potentially causing later higher morbidity and mortality than other infants. There is still a generalized lack of detailed information regarding diagnosis and later mortality in such infants. Therefore, this study was designed to determine the causes and prevalence of mortality among infants that were discharged from the NICU at Royal University Hospital, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada. The names of infants discharged alive from the NICU for the years 1991 and 1992 were cross-referenced to the list of names of infants that died and were registered at the centre of Vital Statistics, Regina, Saskatchewan, for two years after each discharge. Information regarding diagnoses and causes of death were gathered from hospital charts. There were 1162 discharges and 26 deaths. 10 infants died of multiple congenital anomalies including chromosomal anomalies, 8 died of sequelae of congenital heart disease and 4 infants died of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS). 4 infants died of other causes (metabolic disorder, asphyxia, aspiration and pneumonia). Our NICU provides service for 8,000 births per year giving a mortality rate of 1.6/1000 live births. These results indicate that death in NICU graduates up to 2 years after discharge was not significantly higher than deaths reported in other infants of a similar age group. (1 to 1.4/1000) The major causes of death were multiple anomalies and congenital heart defects. Potentially preventable deaths were SIDS, infection and aspiration.