Hanyang Med Rev.
2011 Nov;31(4):246-253. 10.7599/hmr.2011.31.4.246.
Nutritional Support in Premature Infants
- Affiliations
-
- 1Department of Pediatrics, Samsung Medical Center, Sungkyunkwan University School of Medicine, Seoul, Korea. yschang@skku.edu
- KMID: 1451837
- DOI: http://doi.org/10.7599/hmr.2011.31.4.246
Abstract
- In the early postnatal period, prematurely born infants, especially those born at the earliest limits of viability, face a nutritional crisis. A lack of essential nutrients may result in substantial developmental morbidity. In particular, because this period is crucial to proper neurodevelopment, a central concern must be providing essential nutrition for proper neurodevelopment, and the prevention of long-term neuro-deficits. Therefore, providing appropriate nutrition for growth and development is one of the most essential concerns in the care of preterm infants. The optimal goal for providing nutrition in the preterm infant is to achieve a postnatal growth rate approximating that of the normal fetus at the same gestational age. However, extra-uterine growth restriction develops during the course of care for most very low birth weight infants admitted to the neonatal intensive care unit. Herein, the optimal nutrient requirements and most recently recommended total parenteral and enteral feeding strategies are reviewed to provide neonatal clinicians with current guidelines for nutritional care that can improve neurodevelopmental outcomes in preterm infants during and after treatment in the neonatal intensive care unit.
