Babies with Very Low Birth Weights Have Poor Quality Lives When Infants

Babies who are not at all plump when born have poor quality lives until they turn 3 or 4 of age. A recent study carried out by experts at the Institute of Community Health Nursing at the National Yang-Ming University, Taiwan, showed that babies who have very low birth weights are very likely to suffer from a wide range of health disorders in the first years of life.


Writing in the UK-based Journal of Advanced Nursing, Taiwanese researchers led by Dr Li-Yin Chien found that babies who weighed 2500 g or less at birth have high risks of having a poor quality of life when pre-school children. They can develop various health problems, including poor lung and motor function and lack of appetite. Besides physical problems, low weight toddlers are also less anxious, cheerful and lively than their normal-weight counterparts.


Parents of babies who did not weigh more than 1500 g at birth admitted that their children have more health issues and are less active and joyful than other toddlers who had a normal weight when delivered into the world. The team found that of all the babies investigated in the study, 29% of the low birth weight infants presented health issues as compared to only 18% of normal birth weight infants.


"Previous studies of very low birth-weight babies have mostly focused on issues such as death, illness, neurodevelopment, growth and cognitive ability. Our research underlines the importance of monitoring quality of life in children with low birth weights to identify those at risk and intervene early," highlighted Dr. Chien who is also an Associate Professor at the National Yang-Ming University.

In conclusion, infants with very low weights at birth should not receive special attention only due to health problems. Parents and health care professionals should also pay more attention to toddlers' psychological state and mood and prevent them from developing emotional and affective disorders.

"Healthcare professionals need to consider a number of biological and environmental factors as part of their assessment. These include current health problems, age at delivery, length of stay in the neonatal intensive care unit and the educational level of the primary caregiver," concluded the Taiwanese team in their report.