An Exploratory Study Into a New Head Ultrasound Marker for Predicting Neurodevelopmental Outcomes in Preterm Infants

Preterm infants are at risk of neurological impairments and long-term developmental delay. Head ultrasound (HUS) is a promising tool for early detection of preterm brain injury and prediction of neurodevelopmental outcomes. We performed a retrospective analysis of data of 42 preterm infants with neurodevelopmental follow-up at 12 to 24 months corrected age. Corpus callosum length (CC length) and corpus callosum-fastigium length (CCF length) were measured on the HUS scans. Motor function and communication skills were assessed using evaluation scales. Corpus callosum length and CCF length were correlated with neurodevelopmental outcomes using Spearman correlation analysis. Neither CC length nor CCF length correlated with motor developmental outcomes. On early HUS, the CCF length was negatively correlated with symbolic composite percentile ranks (Spearman ρ = -0.49, P = 0.033) and total percentile ranks (Spearman ρ = -0.545, P = 0.016). On follow-up HUS scans, the CCF length was also found to be negatively correlated with social composite raw scores and percentile ranks (Spearman ρ = -0.615, P = 0.005; and Spearman ρ = -0.64, P = 0.003, respectively), symbolic composite raw scores and percentile ranks (Spearman ρ = -0.609, P = 0.006; and Spearman ρ = -0.657, P = 0.002, respectively) and total raw scores and percentile ranks (Spearman ρ = -0.472, P = 0.041; and Spearman ρ = -0.504, P = 0.028, respectively). Corpus callosum-fastigium length measurement on serial HUS is useful in predicting cognitive and behavioral outcomes at corrected age 12 to 24 months.