ESPE Abstracts

Objective: To evaluate the impact of gestational age and birthweight on dehydroepiandrosterone and dehydroepiandrosterone-sulfate (DHEA and DHEA-S) in children born very preterm (VPT) appropriate for gestational age (GA) compared to children born at term (T).Methods: We recorded anthropometric parameters in 72 VPT (<32 GA) and 41 T (≥ 38 GA) aged 5.0–8.5 years. Birthweight standard deviation scores (BW-SDS) were calculated using INTERGROWT...

Background: Osteopenia of prematurity (OOP) is serious but common concerns for parents of premature babies. Reduced bone mineralization results in OOP, or low bone density. The incidence of OOP has increased as a result of medical advancements that have allowed more very low birth weight (VLBW) infants to survive. It is inversely proportional to the intrauterine gestational age (GA).Objective: to study the risk factors a...

Rationale: Bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD) is a common complication after preterm birth that is associated with neurodevelopmental impairment. Neurofilament light chain (NfL) has been identified as a biomarker for neuroaxonal damage in preterm infants, but its relation with BPD has not yet been established. We hypothesized that BPD is associated with increased NfL levels at an early stage, indicative of early neuroaxonal damage....

Introduction: Preterm delivery may comport blood serum Insulin-like Growth Factor-I (IG1) decrements and lower body temperature during the first days of postnatal life of the human newborn (NWB). We evaluated the role of preterm delivery in associations between axillary temperature (TEMP) and IG1 in NWBs without life-threatening disease.Methods: NWBs with any among total parenteral nutrition, blood transfusion, therapeutic hypothermia, life-threatening d...

Background: Birth chest circumference (BC) may be related to Insulin-like-Growth-Factor-I blood serum levels (IG1) in the human newborn (NWB).Objective and hypotheses: We evaluated the relevance of birth body weight (BW) to birth crown-heel length (BL) ratio (BW through BL, BW/BL) in BC relations to IG1 after control for BW for birth gestational age (GA)<=10th centile (SGA), respiratory oxygen supplementation (O2S) and assisted ventilation of any kin...

Background: Approximately 15 million children are born preterm worldwide yearly.Objective and hypotheses: To evaluate spontaneous growth during the first 8 years of life.Hypotheses: Preterm born children have spontaneous recovery of weight and height in the first 8 years of life.Method: Measurements at birth, 6, 12 and 24 months of corrected age and at recall [6.4±0.5 years (5.2–8.0)]. Weight, lengt...

Background: The human foetal adrenal (FA) undergoes vast physiological changes as pregnancy progresses. Original descriptions of FA development emerged following morphometric studies from spontaneous/medical terminations. These revealed the greatest increase in FA size was during the first trimester. Recently, sonographic evaluation of human FA volume and length has led to the creation of normal FA growth centiles and correlations between FA size and estimated foetal weight (E...

Background/objective and hypotheses: Chest circumference (CC) is related to intrauterine growth rate as well as to development-function of respiratory system. We evaluated the relevance of birth body weight (BW) in birth CC (BC) relations to blood serum IGF1 after control for preterm birth (PTB), oxygen (O2) supplementation as %O2 in respiratory gases (O2R) and assisted ventilation of any kind (AV) in the newborn (NWB) without life-threatening ...

Objective: Minipuberty (MP) is still not well defined in small for gestational age (SGA) infants, due to controversial literature data. The present study aims to evaluate MP in SGA infants, both preterm and full-term, compared with those born adequate for gestational age (AGA), during the first year of life.Design: Case-Control, Prospective Study.Methods: The study population included 33 SGA newbor...

Background and aim: Congenital growth hormone deficiency (cGHD) is a rare but life-threatening condition whose diagnosis is challenging in the absence of reliable reference values, both in healthy neonates and in preterm ones. We recently estimated GH reference interval in 1036 healthy, at-term newborns (HN) form dried blood spot samples using a previously validated analytical method.Aim: of this study is to provide valu...