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Abstract

Aim: Neonatal sepsis and necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC) have a great impact on morbidity and mortality in immature newborns. We performed our trial to examine the impact of enteral bovine colostrum administration upon late neonatal sepsis in premature newborns. Patients &Procedures: The study included neonates who had a birth weight (BW) of 1-1.8 kg, a gestational age (GA) of full 28-34 weeks, and a postnatal age of ≤ 96 hours. A blinded, randomized, placebo-controlled study was done using two groups; one of them received bovine colostrum daily within the first 96 hours starting from the 2nd day of feeding and for 14 days, while the other group received a placebo. The primary outcomes evaluated were sepsis; the secondary outcomes encompassed necrotizing enterocolitis, duration until complete enteral feeding, length of hospitalization, and overall death. Results: The study included 35 participants, comprising 16 infants receiving bovine colostrum and 19 receiving a placebo. The baseline demographic criteria and clinical features of the groups were balanced. Late sepsis occurred in 25.0% of the bovine colostrum group compared with 10.5% in the control group (p = 0.258). No reported definite necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC) cases in either group (p = 0.612). However, suspected NEC was observed in 6.2% of the bovine colostrum group, while none were reported in the control group (p = 0.269). The median time to full feeding was 8.0 days (IQR: 6.0-11.0) for the bovine colostrum group and 7.0 days (IQR: 5.5-9.0) for the non-intervention group (p = 0.404). The median duration of hospitalization was 22.5 days (IQR: 13.0-29.8) for the bovine colostrum group and 24.0 days (IQR: 20.5-30.0) for the control group (p = 0.596). Allcause mortality was recorded at 12.5% in the bovine colostrum group and none in the control group (p = 0.112). Conclusion: Our investigation revealed no significant differences in the incidence of confirmed or suspected sepsis and NEC, duration until ull enteral feeding, length of hospital admissions, or all-cause death in comparison to placebo.

Article Type

Original Study

Subject Area

Pediatrics

IRB Number

HG000066

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-Share Alike 4.0 International License.

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