Potential for improving premature baby care

One in two premature babies receives transfusions of red blood cells (RBC) due to anaemia. There are no generally accepted clinical guidelines for the degree of anaemia necessitating blood transfusions. MedUni Vienna researchers have now conducted a critical review of the currently available literature. Their review has been published in the prestigious journal "The Lancet Haematology" and is intended as an impetus to further research in this area and to develop improvements in neonatal intensive care medicine. The problem underlying the scientists' review is not the lack of studies on red blood cell transfusions in premature babies but the sparse scientific evidence that is available. In their review, the team led by Angelika Berger and Vito Giordano from the Division of Neonatology, Intensive Care Medicine and Neuropediatrics at MedUni Vienna's Department of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine points out several issues that reduce comparability between the studies, consequently making it virtually impossible to incorporate the results into clinical guidelines. Furthermore, on the basis of the available literature, it cannot be reliably determined whether the administration of RBC transfusions is associated with complications in preterm infants such as diseases of the intestine (necrotising enterocolitis), retina (retinopathy of prematurity) or the lung (bronchopulmonary dysplasia), or with neurodevelopmental impairments.