Clinical characteristics of children with very low and extremely low birth weight

Abstract

This article is devoted to the analysis of clinical characteristics of children with very low and extremely low body weight at birth, depending on sex, gestational age and body weight. The study included 434 children with gestational age less than 32 weeks, who were admitted to the neonatal intensive care (NICU), Tomsk Perinatal Center during the period of 2013-2014, medical information of which was collected retrospectively. As a result of the analysis, the majority of infants were found to have bronchopulmonary dysplasia, necrotizing enterocolitis, retinopathy ofprematurity, intraventricular hemorrhage and hemodynamically significant disorders of the cardiovascular system. The presence of pathological conditions, more were typical for the infant with birth body weight less than 1000 g, an increased likelihood of development of the each disease studied being more than 3 times. On the other hand birth weight more than 1000 g and gestational age greater than 32 weeks had a protective effect against the formation of pathological conditions studied. An analysis of odds ratios showed that in the case where birth weight less than 1000 g probability of the presence of any of the above pathological conditions, as well as comorbidity in the infant is above tenfold (OR 9,97; CI95% 5,0-19,8). In this regard, the provision of specialized medical care for pregnant women from high risk groups and search of technologies to prolong pregnancy until 32 weeks and/or weight of the fetus more than 1000 g and more is needed to improve the survival rates of preterm patients and prevent severe disabling conditions later.