Author(s)

Li Shen^1,2, Tao Bo¹, Senlin Luo¹, Ruolin Zhang¹, Jian Li^1*

¹Division of Neonatology, Children’s Medical Center, The Second Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha, China.
²Department of Neonatology, The Maternal and Child Health Hospital of Hunan Province, Changsha, China.

To investigate bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD) and its treatment with dexamethasone (DEX) in premature infants with birth weight (BW) < 1500 g. We retrospectively reviewed the records of preterm infants admitted to the Division of Neonatology, the Second Xiangya Hospital, Central South University between September 2011 and December 2014. Patients were excluded if they needed oxygen therapy but were lost to follow-up at ≤36 weeks post-menstrual age (PMA) or <56 days after birth, or they had severe congenital anomalies. The incidence of BPD was 18% (37/212). Gestational age (GA) was <32 weeks in all BPD patients. GA, BW, and Apgar scores were lower and hospitalization duration and pulmonary surfactant (PS) use were higher in the BPD group than in the non-BPD group (P < 0.05). Risk factors for BPD included neonatal respiratory distress syndrome, neonatal pneumonia, positive sputum culture, pulmonary hemorrhage, respiratory failure. Multivariate logistic regression revealed that GA (odds ratio [OR]: 0.479, P = 0.004) and neonatal respiratory distress syndrome (OR: 6.146, P = 0.043) were independent risk factors for BPD. DEX was administered to 26 patients after the diagnosis of BPD. After one and two weeks of DEX treatment, the oxygen requirement had significantly reduced compared to the week prior to treatment (P < 0.05), while during treatment, the weight gain rate and weight gain efficiency slower significantly than that during either of the two preceding weeks (P < 0.001). These results suggest that low GA was the most important risk factor for BPD, DEX reduced oxygen dependency but decreased weight gain.

Bronchopulmonary Dysplasia, Very Low Birth Weight Infants, Oxygen Therapy, Dexamethasone, Weight Gain

Shen, L. , Bo, T. , Luo, S. , Zhang, R. and Li, J. (2016) Bronchopulmonary Dysplasia in Premature Infants with Very Low Birth Weight: A Single Centre Retrospective Study in China. Open Journal of Pediatrics, 6, 295-307. doi: 10.4236/ojped.2016.64041.