Neonatal hypoglycaemia is a commonly occurring condition in newborns, whereby low blood sugar will cause an immediate energy shortage for the developing child, especially it’s brain. If left untouched it’s associated with brain injury and poor neurodevelopmental outcome.

Neonatal hypoglycaemia affects as many as 5–15% of otherwise healthy babies, and is widespread in resource-poor countries. Furthermore, prevalence of the disorder is increasing because of the increasing incidence of preterm birth and maternal factors, such as diabetes and obesity, which can predispose babies to hypoglycaemia.

Rapid correction of the hypoglycaemia by regular feeding and/or by supplying dextrose is in any case desirable to prevent morbidity and the preferred way to do so may vary dependent on the baby’s birthweight and gestational age. In late preterm and term babies, initial management focuses on feeding and increased monitoring, requiring repeated and painful blood tests. If blood glucose concentration remains low, admission to the newborn intensive-care unit for intravenous glucose is usually indicated. Such admission inherently means that mother and baby are separated, which can delay the establishment of breastfeeding (1).

DexProNeo offers a simple, sterile and cost effective method to supply dextrose to hypoglycaemic newborns, whereby dosing can be easily adjusted to the birth weight.

Footnotes

1 Harris, D., Weston, P., Signal, M., Chase, J., & Harding, J. (2013). Dextrose gel for neonatal hypoglycaemia (the Sugar Babies Study): a randomised, double blind, placebo-controlled trial. The Lancet, 382: 2077-2083.