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Development of sucking patterns in pre-term infants with bronchopulmonary dysplasia

Saakje P da Costa1, Cees P van der Schans, Mar J Zweens

  • 1Research and Innovation Group in Health Care and Nursing, Hanze University, Applied Sciences, Groningen, The Netherlands. s.p.da.costa@pl.hanze.nl

Neonatology
|May 11, 2010
PubMed

Insights

Pre-term infants with bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD) struggle with coordinating sucking, swallowing, and breathing, especially before term-equivalent age. However, their sucking patterns normalize and resemble those of infants without BPD after this age.

Area of Science:

  • Neonatal development
  • Pediatric respiratory medicine
  • Neurodevelopmental disorders

Background:

  • Infants born prematurely with bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD) face risks of brain abnormalities.
  • Breathing difficulties in infants with BPD can impact the development of their oral-motor skills, specifically sucking patterns.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To longitudinally assess and compare the development of sucking patterns in pre-term infants with and without BPD.
  • To identify specific oral-motor challenges related to BPD in early infancy.

Main Methods:

  • Prospective assessment of sucking patterns using the Neonatal Oral-Motor Assessment Scale in 16 infants with BPD and 15 without.
  • Matching infants for gestational age (<30 weeks) and recording feeding episodes from 34 to 50 weeks' post-menstrual age.
  • Classifying sucking patterns as normal, dysfunctional, or disorganized and analyzing their development in relation to clinical factors.

Main Results:

  • Abnormal sucking patterns, particularly disorganized patterns and incoordination of sucking, swallowing, and breathing, were more prevalent in infants with BPD before term-equivalent age.
  • No significant difference in the overall prevalence of normal sucking episodes between groups.
  • No difference observed in the age of acquiring normal sucking patterns between infants with and without BPD.

Conclusions:

  • Infants with BPD exhibit a developmental characteristic of impaired coordination between sucking, swallowing, and breathing, especially before term-equivalent age.
  • After term-equivalent age, the sucking pattern development in infants with BPD closely aligns with that of their peers without BPD.
  • Clinical characteristics did not significantly influence the developmental trajectory of sucking patterns in this cohort.
Abstract

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