OBJECTIVE Development of the gastrointestinal tract and immune system can be modulated by the gut microbiota. Establishment of the intestinal microbiota, in its turn, is affected by host and environmental factors. As such, development of the gut microbiota is greatly impacted in preterm infants, who have an immature gut and are exposed to factors like hospitalization, caesarean section, antibio...

Bunt JE, Rietveld T, Schierbeek H, Darcos Wattimena JL, Zimmermann LJ, van Goudoever JB. Albumin synthesis in preterm infants on the first day of life studied with [1-C]leucine. Am J Physiol Gastrointest Liver Physiol 292: G1157–G1161, 2007. First published January 18, 2007; doi:10.1152/ajpgi.00300.2006.—Albumin is the major binding protein in the human neonate. Low production of albumin will l...

Lower blood glucose values are common in the healthy neonate immediately after birth as compared to older infants, children, and adults. These transiently lower glucose values improve and reach normal ranges within hours after birth. Such transitional hypoglycemia is common in the healthy newborn. A minority of neonates experience a more prolonged and severe hypoglycemia, usually associated wit...

Infections are the commonest cause of death in infants less than four weeks old. Treatment, in a neonate with signs of sepsis needs to be initiated as soon as possible, before the causative organism is known. In the developed world neonatal severity scores have been created to estimate the risk of a neonate having a poor outcome. These scores rely on biochemical and haematological parameters wh...

Manganese (Mn) is an essential trace metal found in all tissues, and it is required for normal amino acid, lipid, protein, and carbohydrate metabolism. While Mn deficiency is extremely rare in humans, toxicity due to overexposure of Mn is more prevalent. The brain appears to be especially vulnerable. Mn neurotoxicity is most commonly associated with occupational exposure to aerosols or dusts th...

This Clinical Guideline has been developed to guide clinical practice based on the authors’ assessment of current published evidence on glycemic control in the neonate (within the first month of life) receiving parenteral nutrition (PN). The neonate receiving PN is worthy of special consideration with respect to glucose control, as this population carries an elevated risk of hyperand hypoglycem...

OBJECTIVE To investigate the influence of prospectively measured smoking during pregnancy on aspects of neonatal behavior in a large community sample. METHODS Participants were mothers and infants from the Providence, Rhode Island, cohort of the National Collaborative Perinatal Project enrolled between 1960 and 1966. Mothers with pregnancy/medical complications and infants with medical compli...

BACKGROUND Predicting later outcome in neonates presenting with severe inborn errors of metabolism (IEM) is difficult. The assessment of the early motor repertoire is a reliable method of evaluating the integrity of the central nervous system in young infants. This method is based on an age-specific qualitative assessment of general movements (GMs, 0-8 weeks of age), fidgety movements (FMs) and...

There is a major resurgence of interest in brown adipose tissue (BAT) biology, particularly regarding its determinants and consequences in newborns and infants. Reliable methods for non-invasive BAT measurement in human infants have yet to be demonstrated. The current study first validates methods for quantitative BAT imaging of rodents post mortem followed by BAT excision and re-imaging of exc...

This single-subject research study with replication evaluated the effect of daily occupational therapy on the nutritive and nonnutritive sucking behaviors of three high-risk, premature infants. At the time of entrance into the study, the infants were 34 to 35 weeks old and were documented poor feeders. Treatment consisted of individual, multimodal sensory stimulation, with emphasis on proprioce...