Biomedical subjects
J A Bier
Publications and source records attributed to J A Bier.
Comparison of skin-to-skin contact with standard contact in low-birth-weight infants who are breast-fed.
OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the effects of maternal-infant skin-to-skin contact (SSC) vs standard contact (SC) on low-birth-weight infants' physiological profile, maternal milk production, and duration of breast-feeding. DESIGN: Prospective, randomized, interventional study with cohort followed up for 6 months after discharge from the hospital. SETTING: Special care nursery with follow-up telephone calls after discharge from the hospital. PATIENTS: Fifty infants, with birth weights less than 1500 g and whose mothers planned to breast-feed, randomized to 2 groups: SSC (experimental) and SC (control). INTERVENTION: In the SSC group, infants were clothed in diaper and held upright between mothers' breasts; both mother and infant were covered with a blanket. In the SC group, infants were clothed, wrapped in blankets, and held cradled in mother's arms. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Infant physiological data, ie, oxygen saturation, heart rate, respiratory rate, and axillary temperature; maternal milk production; and duration of breast-feeding. RESULTS: Oxygen saturation was higher during SSC than during SC (P < .001); 11% of the oxygen saturation recordings during SSC vs 24% during SC indicated the values less than 90% (P < .001). A more stable milk production was noted in the SSC group. No differences were noted in infant temperature, heart rate, or respiratory rate. Ninety percent of mothers in the SSC group vs 61% in the SC group continued breast-feeding for the duration of the infants' hospitalization (P < .05), and 50% in the SSC group vs 11% in the SC continued breast-feeding through 1 month after discharge (P < .01). CONCLUSIONS: During SSC with their mothers, low-birth-weight infants maintain a higher oxygen saturation and are less likely to have desaturation to less than 90% oxygen than are infants exposed to SC. Mothers in the SSC group are more likely to continue breast-feeding until 1 month after discharge.
Developmental delay caused by a supernumerary chromosome, inv dup (15), identified by fluorescent in situ hybridization.
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Other thoughts on harassment.
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The oral motor development of low-birth-weight infants who underwent orotracheal intubation during the neonatal period.
OBJECTIVE: To investigate the potential development of oral motor problems following prolonged orotracheal intubation in low-birth-weight infants. DESIGN: Prospective observational. SETTING: Tertiary-care hospital. PATIENTS: Fifty-one low-birth-weight infants and 10 full-term infants divided into three groups--group 1 with 15 low-birth-weight infants (< or = 1250 g) who had been intubated for more than 1 week; group 2 with 36 low-birth-weight infants who had been intubated for 1 week or less; and group 3 with 10 full-term control infants. INTERVENTIONS: None. MEASUREMENTS AND RESULTS: Oral motor assessments of nutritive sucking were compared at corrected ages of term and 3 months. The results showed that low-birth-weight infants with prolonged intubation had significantly poorer sucking abilities at both term and 3 months. The number of days of oxygen use and the postnatal age (weeks) at which nipple feeding was begun were the most powerful predictors of sucking ability at term (P < .001), whereas the number of days of orotracheal intubation and gestational age at birth were the most powerful predictors of sucking ability at 3 months (P < .001).
Anti-amalgamism.
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The frequency of chromosomal abnormalities in patients referred for fragile X analysis.
The present paper summarizes our existing database on chromosomal abnormalities found in patients referred because of a question of the Fragile X Syndrome during the period from January 1, 1990 to June 30, 1995. Cytogenetic results were derived from testing performed at the cytogenetics laboratory at Rhode Island Hospital. All positive fragile X individuals detected among our sample population represent index patients from separate kindreds. Of a total of 327 cases referred for fragile X testing, 10 (3.06 percent) were found to be positive for fragile X by either cytogenetics alone or by both cytogenetics and DNA testing, 12 (3.60 percent) were found to be positive for either a numerical or structural chromosomal abnormality, while 10 (3.06 percent) were found to exhibit a heteromorphism. Positive chromosomal findings included numerical chromosomal abnormalities of the sex chromosomes and autosomes, deletions, and translocations. Heteromorphism mostly involved an increase in the length of heterochromatic regions of certain chromosomes as well as a pericentric inversion of a chromosome 9, usually considered normal variants. It is concluded that chromosomal abnormalities other than fragile X are found with equal and, in some cases, higher frequency than the frequency of fragile X positivity in patients referred for a question of the Fragile X Syndrome. Our figures, consistent with those reported in the literature, underscore the value of routine karyotyping in this population of patients. Except under special circumstances, it is important that GTG-banding analysis be performed so that the entire human genome be examined in addition to scoring for the fragile X mutation on Xq27.3. Especially in view of the recent finding of the relative rarity of this condition, the exclusive use of DNA analysis is not advised.