Frequency of Neurologic Disorders in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit and Associated Factors

Kim, Dong Won; Suh, Eun Sook

Abstract

PURPOSE: Recent neonatal care unit survival rates have improved. These increasing survival rates have resulted in increased neurologic disorders. So we investigated the sorts and frequency of neurologic disorders at neonatal intensive care unit, association between gestational age and birthweight, neonatal mortality and tendency of neurologic disorders in survivors.
METHODS
Retrospective reviews were made on 156 cases with one or more neurologic disorder of 1,399 neonates, who were admitted to the neonatal intensive care unit, Soonchunhyang Hospital from January 1997 to December 2001. Neurologic disorders were categorized into five groups:intraventricular hemorrhage, neonatal seizures, hypoxic- ischemic encephalopathy, central nervous system infection and central nervous system congenital malformations and chromosomal aberrations.
RESULTS
Over the study period, 156 cases with neurologic disorders had a total of 193 neurologic disorders. The frequency of neurologic disorders increased from 3.2% in 1997 to 11.5% in 2001, while the neonatal mortality rates in intensive care unit have declined from 4.8% in 1997 to 3.7% in 2001. In 156 neonates, 134 had intraventricular hemorrhage, 28 had seizures, 24 had hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy, 2 had central nervous system infections and 5 had congenital central nervous system malformation and chromosomal aberration. Frequencies of intraventricular hemorrhage and seizure has increased, but, that of hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy has not changed, for the 5 years.
CONCLUSION
Neonatal intensive care unit survival rates have improved for 5 years, but, the neurologic morbidity rates have increased. Because neurologic disorders have great influence on the long-term neurologic disability, early detection and treatment of neurologic disorders is important.