Original ArticleLate-Onset Sepsis in Very Low Birth Weight Infants from Singleton and Multiple-Gestation Births
Section snippets
Methods
The study group comprised infants with birth weight 401-1500 g born between January 1, 2002, and December 31, 2008, and seen at NRN clinical centers. Eligibility criteria changed in January 2008 to inborn infants with birth weight 401-1000 g or gestational age 22-28 6/7 weeks. Trained research nurses entered maternal demographic, pregnancy, and delivery information and infant data collected from birth to hospital discharge, death, or 120 days of life into a registry of VLBW infants maintained
Incidence of Infection
A total of 16 713 VLBW singleton infants and 5860 VLBW twins or higher-order multiple-born infants were admitted to NRN centers between 2002 and 2008. Data on LOS status were available for 15 178 singletons and 5294 multiples who met the study's eligibility criteria. The overall rate of LOS was 25.0% (males, 27.3%; females, 22.8%) among singletons and 22.6% (males, 25.2%; females, 20.0%) among multiples. Rates of LOS were similar between singletons and multiples in all gestational age and birth
Discussion
LOS continues to be a major cause of mortality and morbidity among VLBW infants. In the present study, 24.4% of the VLBW infants born between 2002 and 2008 developed at least 1 episode of sepsis beyond day 3 of life. This rate is higher than reported previously. Using the NRN database, Stoll et al6 reported an incidence rate of 21.1% during the period 1998-2000. The greatest increase was seen in the group of infants with birth weight 400-750 g, in whom LOS increased from 42.8% to 52.8%. The
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Cited by (0)
Supported by grants from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child and Human Development (NICHD) for the Neonatal Research Network's Generic Database and Follow-up Studies. Data collected at participating sites of the NICHD Neonatal Research Network were transmitted to RTI International, the data coordinating center for the network, which stored, managed, and analyzed the data for this study. R.H. is an employee of NIH and assisted with the study design, analysis, interpretation of data, writing of the report, and the decision to submit it for publication. The authors declare no conflicts of interest.
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A list of members of the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Neonatal Research Network is available at www.jpeds.com (Appendix).