POSTNATAL BODY WEIGHT CURVES FOR INFANTS BELOW 1000 g BIRTH WEIGHT RECEIVING EARLY ENTERAL NUTRITION

J. Pauls . K. Bauer, H. Versmold,

Department of Pediatrics, Freie Universität Berlin, Universitätsklinikum, Benjamin Franklin, Berlin, Germany

Objective: No body weight curves are available for preterm infants <1000g birth weight receiving early enteral and parenteral nutrition.

Methods: Postnatal weight changes of 136 infants with a birth weight <1000 g were analysed retrospectively. Body weight curves for the first 30 days of life were generated for five separate birth weight groups (430-599 g, 600-699 g, 700-799 g, 800-899 g, 900-999 g). All infants had received intravenous glucose and amino acids from day 1 and intravenous lipids from day 2. Enteral feeding was started on day 1. Thus caloric intake (SD) was advanced to 384 ± 46 kj/kg per day (92 ± 11 kcal/kg per day) in the first week of life.

Results: In 136 preterm infants mean postnatal weight loss was 10.1% ± 4.6%, of birth weight, birth weight was regained at a mean postnatal age of 11 ± 3.7 days, but significantly earlier in the lowest compared to the highest weight group. Mean subsequent weight gain was 15.7 ± 7.2 g/kg per day. This was accomplished by exclusive enteral feeding from day 20 (median).

Conclusions: Our body weight curves are more adequate to evaluate growth of preterm infants than older published reference values because they are based on infants treated according to current nutritional standards.