| Hypothermia therapy for neonatal encephalopathy | |
|---|---|
| Specialty | Neonatologist(pediatrician) |
Mild total body hypothermia, induced by cooling a baby to 33-34°C for three days after birth, is nowadays a standardized treatment after moderate to severe hypoxic ischemic encephalopathy in full-term and near to fullterm neonates.[1][2] It has recently been proven to be the only medical intervention which reduces brain damage, and improves an infant's chance of survival and reduced disability.
Hypoxic ischemic encephalopathy has many causes and is defined essentially as the reduction in the supply of blood or oxygen to a baby's brain before, during, or even after birth. It is a major cause of death and disability, occurring in approximately 2–3 per 1000 births and causing around 20% of all cases of cerebral palsy. A 2013 Cochrane review found that therapeutic hypothermia is useful in full term babies with encephalopathy.[3]
- ^ Azzopardi D, Brocklehurst P, Edwards D, Halliday H, Levene M, Thoresen M, Whitelaw A (April 2008). "The TOBY Study. Whole body hypothermia for the treatment of perinatal asphyxial encephalopathy: a randomised controlled trial". BMC Pediatrics. 8 (1): 17. doi:10.1186/1471-2431-8-17. PMC 2409316. PMID 18447921.
- ^ Shankaran S, Laptook AR, Ehrenkranz RA, Tyson JE, McDonald SA, Donovan EF, et al. (October 2005). "Whole-body hypothermia for neonates with hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy". The New England Journal of Medicine. 353 (15): 1574–1584. doi:10.1056/nejmcps050929. PMID 16221780.
- ^ Jacobs SE, Berg M, Hunt R, Tarnow-Mordi WO, Inder TE, Davis PG (January 2013). "Cooling for newborns with hypoxic ischaemic encephalopathy". The Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews. 1 (1): CD003311. doi:10.1002/14651858.CD003311.pub3. PMC 7003568. PMID 23440789.