Monitoring Postnatal Growth in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit

Abstract

Standards for growth of premature infants have often been based on in utero growth rates even though infants born prematurely do not exhibit in utero growth patterns after birth. These growth charts do not allow for daily recording of data and are prone to error in recording data as a function of postmenstrual age. Other growth curves based on observations in preterm infants do not extend beyond 40 to 105 days of age, although these infants are often hospitalized for longer periods of time. To address these practical limitations of available growth charts, we devised a method of plotting growth parameters in the neonatal intensive care unit on the basis of previously published standards of growth and estimates of expected growth. Compared with previously published curves, the monitoring system we present offers the following advantages: (1) weight tracking based on postnatal age and head circumference and length tracking based on postmenstrual age; (2) daily recording of weight for 168 days; and (3) recording of postnatal age in conjunction with the length and head circumference measurements to minimize error.

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