Determination of the Prevalence of Patent Ductus Arteriosus in Infants with Very Low Birth Weight Admitted in Hospital during 2011-2016

Abstract

Introduction: The ductus arteriosus is one of the most common cardiac anomalies in premature neonates. Understanding its dimensions among high-risk groups such as infants with very low birth weight (VLBW) can be helpful in preventing and timely treatment.
Methods: This study was conducted to determine the prevalence of patent ductus arteriosus (PDA) in VLBW infants in Shahid Akbar Abadi Hospital during the years of 2011-2016. In this observational and cross-sectional study, 286 extremely low birth weight (ELBW) infants (Results: In the present study, the mean (SD) of the gestational age, birth weight, Apgar score were determined to be 27.27 ± 0.15 weeks, 835.20 ± 42.6 and 5.31 ± 0.13, respectively. Based on the data presented herein, 57.70% of the neonates were found to be female. Our findings indicated that 95.9% of the LBW infants showed PDA, of which 14% exhibited spontaneous closure. The ductus arteriosus was closed spontaneously in 14% of patients, and small, moderate and large PDA were observed in 34.25%, 3.5% and 4.15%, respectively.
Conclusion: Our results showed that there was a significant relationship between the PDA with sepsis (P=0.032) and small PDA was more common in sepsis cases. Furthermore, the mean score of Apgar score was found to be significantly different (P=0.001), when severe cases were observed to be higher in neonates with lower Apgar score. Taken together, our results revealed that PDA is present in more than half of the infants with VLBW.