Newborns, who saw the world a bit earlier have a higher risk of a number of diseases in infancy, a new study showed.
An aforementioned research published in the British Medical Journal, opposed the very common notion that babies born a few weeks earlier have the same health conditions as those who were born at the normal term.
The study was based at a sample of 14,00 children, who became the study target up ti the age of 5. Researchers were particularly interested in the impact of early birth on health during infancy.
Previous studies made the focus on children born really early – before 32 weeks. But the study from the BMJ showed that babies born before 39 weeks may need some additional care too.
Results presented in the article depicted the increase of health problem chance in groups of babies born before 39 weeks in the first 5 years of life.
Asthma or wheezing are the most common diseases young children are affected (around 15% of a sample). Interestingly, the figure are likely to increase to 17% for those born earlier for a couple of weeks. Moreover, they more likely to go to hospital with a number of other diseases.
The authors of the study were striving to pay attention to the fact that parents should not be overwhelmingly worried about the results of study, because the increase of the illness chance is just slightly raised.
As researchers suggest the utmost outcome of the study is to provide early born babies in infancy, as well as their parents with a good quality of healthcare.
Dr Elaine Boyle, who is one of the authors of the study, said that they had found inappropriate to treat early born babies equally to those born at the full term. There is a modest increase of health problems.
Andy Cole, the executive of a child charity Bliss thinks that research is really useful. He thinks that the study helps to understand better the early-born babies and their needs.
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