Purpose
Maintaining body temperature is a key vital function of human beings, but little is known about how body temperature of high-risk infants is sustained during early life after birth. The aim of this study was to describe hypothermia in high-risk infants during their first week of life and examine demographic, environmental, and clinical attributors of hypothermia.
Methods
A retrospective longitudinal study was done from January 1, 2013 to December 31, 2015. Medical records of 570 high-risk infants hospitalized at Neonatal Intensive Care Units (NICU) of a university affiliated hospital were examined. Body temperature and related factors were assessed for seven days after birth.
Results
A total of 336 events of hypothermia (212 mild and 124 moderate) occurred in 280 neonates (49.1%) and most events (84.5%) occurred within 24 hours after birth. Logistic regression analysis revealed that phototherapy (aOR=0.28, 95% CI=0.10-0.78), Apgar score at 5 minute (aOR=2.20, 95% CI=1.17-4.12), and intra-uterine growth retardation or small for gestational age (aOR=3.58, 95% CI=1.69-7.58) were statistically significant contributors to hypothermia.
Conclusion
Findings indicate that high-risk infants are at risk for hypothermia even when in the NICU. More advanced nursing interventions are necessary to prevent hypothermia of high-risk infants.

Citations

• Using a Plastic Drape to Reduce Hypothermia in Premature Neonates During Peripherally Inserted Central Catheter Placement
  Huong (Kelle) T. Phan, Teresa M. McIntyre
  Advances in Neonatal Care.2022; 22(3): 193.     CrossRef

Purpose
Oral glucose and pH are known as critical indicators for the growth of microorganism inside the oral cavity. This study was performed to identify oral glucose and pH variances in the early postnatal days of newborns.
Methods
An explorative study which included 67 newborns was conducted to measure the oral glucose and pH during the first three days of life. Oral secretions were collected every 8 hours for three days or 6 to 9 times immediately after birth up to discharge. Oral glucose and pH variances during the three days were analyzed using the SPSS 22.0.
Results
Oral glucose was 30.66±22.01mg/dl at birth then increased to 54.77±27.96mg/dl at the third day of life (F=8.04, p<.001) while oral pH decreased from 7.35±0.36 to 5.53±0.39 during the three days (F=113.35, p<.001). Oral glucose and pH were related to gestational age, regurgitation, and maternal diabetic mellitus. A negative correlation was found between oral glucose and pH (r=-.34, p<.001).
Conclusion
Oral glucose and pH can be utilized for oral health assessment in newborns. Further study is needed to explore the factors which influence oral glucose and pH in high-risk newborns.

Purpose
This descriptive study was performed to explore trends in child health nursing research by analyzing the themes, contents and structure of articles published in 2014 in Child Health Nursing Research, the official journal of the Korean Academy of Child Health Nursing.
Methods
Thirty-eight articles were reviewed using keywords, author (s), subjects, ethical considerations, designs, statistics involved, funding resources, and others.
Results
Ten domains from 160 keywords were identified as follows, child related, psycho-social variable related, parents and family related, nursing and health related, and others. A mean of 2.9 authors per article was identified and 71% of the authors were academic-affiliated. Twenty-eight articles were human-participant related while 21 articles addressed both Institutional Review Board and written consent. Non-experimental design was the most commonly used method followed by experimental design, and qualitative design. The duration for acceptance was a mean of 89.1 days from submission with most articles requiring a second round of article review. Half of the articles were supported by grant organizations such as Korean National Research Foundation.
Conclusion
The findings of the analysis show an improvement in the scientific quality with a diversity of articles in Child Health Nursing Research.

Citations

• Research trends in nurse–parent partnership: A scoping review of the paediatric field in South Korea
  Seo Jin Park, Ji Yeong Yun, Jina Lee, In Young Cho
  Nursing Open.2024;[Epub]     CrossRef
• Text Network Analysis of Research Topics and Trends on Simulations Using Virtual Patients in Nursing Education
  Miok Song, Jeong Eun Moon, Aeri Jang
  CIN: Computers, Informatics, Nursing.2023; 41(9): 639.     CrossRef
• Journal statistics, directions for development, and appreciation for reviewers
  Hyun Young Koo
  Child Health Nursing Research.2022; 28(1): 5.     CrossRef
• Analysis of Studies on High-Risk Infants and Quality Assessment of Intervention Studies
  Hyejung Lee, Anna Kim, Anna Maeng, Gayeong Kim
  Child Health Nursing Research.2016; 22(2): 153.     CrossRef

Purpose
This study was performed to explore the weight variations in high-risk term newborns hospitalized during the early postnatal period.
Methods
A retrospective explorative study was performed with 64 term newborns who were hospitalized in the NICU after birth. Data on daily weight, birth information, and clinical features such as phototherapy, placements, nutritional status were reviewed through medical records for 14 days of life. General Linear Model, GLM was applied to analyze the weight variation by clinical features of these high–risk term newborns for 14 days of life.
Results
Newborns at 40 weeks of gestation showed little weight loss during the few days after birth then steadily gained weight to 7.6% at the 14th day. Infants born at 37-39 gestation showed little weight gain for 14 days though the weight loss itself was not apparent. As well, return to birthweight was not observed in newborns with phototherapy, infants placed on a warmer or infants having gastrointestinal dysfunction for 14 days of life.
Conclusion
Even for term newborns, physiologic weight loss may not be warranted even if newborn is born at less than 40 week of gestation, or with high-risk conditions that warrant admission to NICU.

PURPOSE
An exploratory study was done to examine the validity of the new Ballard scale with extended scoring system(eNBS) in estimating gestational age(AG) in full-term newborns.
METHOD
The eNBS scoring system was extended to include all numbers of total score of NBS and GA to allow a 3-days variation in GA estimation compared to the original scale which has a 2-week variation due to the application of a 5-score interval for the total NBS score and only even numbers for GA. GA by eNBS(GA-eNBS) was compared with GA by LMP(GA-LMP) and GA by standard NBS(GA-sNBS) in 133 full-term newborns. Difference between GA-LMP and GA-eNBS was analyzed for each GA.
RESULTS
Positive correlations were observed in GA-sNBS and GA-eNBS with GA-LMP. There was no difference between GA-LMP and GA-eNBS at 39GA and 40GA. At 37GA and 38GA, GA-eNBS overestimated GA-LMP up to 1 week, while underestimating up to 1 week at 41GA.
CONCLUSIONS
The accuracy of eNBS was validated within 3 days of variation in GA estimation at 39-40GA. Overestimation by eNBS suggests the possible acceleration of fetal maturity in premature newborns, while underestimation, of the deceleration of fetal maturity in postterm newborns.