Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 2020 Feb;188(3):354-366.
doi: 10.1111/bjh.16233. Epub 2019 Oct 6.

Management of anaemia in pre-term infants

Maria Saito-Benz  1   2 , Peter Flanagan  3 , Mary J Berry  1   2   4
Affiliations
Review

Management of anaemia in pre-term infants

Maria Saito-Benz et al. Br J Haematol. 2020 Feb.

Abstract

Pre-term infants have one of the highest transfusion requirements within the hospital-setting. The vast majority of blood transfusions performed in Neonatal Intensive Care Units (NICUs) are for medically stable pre-term infants with anaemia of prematurity, with the aim of improving oxygen delivery to the vital organs during the crucial phase of growth and development. However, despite the frequency of transfusion in this population, the potential benefits and harms of 'top up' transfusion are not fully understood, leading to practice variation between clinicians, institutions and countries. Significant advances have been made in the prevention of anaemia of prematurity, with recent emphasis on optimising infants' circulatory volume at birth via placental transfusion and preserving infants' own blood volume through innovative minimal sampling techniques. More research is urgently needed to establish optimal transfusion thresholds for these high-risk pre-term infants, for whom benefits as well as adverse outcomes may have consequences that extend for decades throughout the recipients' life-course. In this review, we will discuss some of the consensus and controversies regarding optimal management of anaemia in pre-term infants and highlight potential areas for future research.

Keywords: anaemia of prematurity; cerebral regional tissue oxygenation; haemovigilance; pre-term infants; red blood cell transfusion.

PubMed Disclaimer

References

    1. Aher, S.M. & Ohlsson, A. (2019) Late erythropoiesis-stimulating agents to prevent red blood cell transfusion in preterm or low birth weight infants. Cochrane Database Systematic Review, 2, Cd004868.
    1. Aher, S., Malwatkar, K. & Kadam, S. (2008) Neonatal anemia. Seminars in Fetal & Neonatal Medicine, 13, 239-247.
    1. American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (2017) Committee Opinion Number 694: Delayed Umbilical Cord Clamping After Birth. Available from: https://www.acog.org/About-ACOG/News-Room/News-Releases/2016/Delayed-Umb... Accessed 10 April 2019 .
    1. Andersen, C.C., Keir, A.K., Kirpalani, H.M. & Stark, M.J. (2015) Anaemia in the premature infant and red blood cell transfusion: new approaches to an age-old problem. Current Treatment Options in Pediatrics, 1, 191-201.
    1. Andersen, C.C., Hodyl, N.A., Kirpalani, H.M. & Stark, M.J. (2017) A theoretical and practical approach to defining "adequate oxygenation" in the preterm newborn. Pediatrics, 139, e20161117.

Publication types

LinkOut - more resources