A Comparison of Intrauterine Growth Chart’s Classification of Preterm Infants
Disciplines
Vital and Health Statistics
Abstract (300 words maximum)
Intrauterine growth charts are a visual representation of a cross section of infants achieved size at birth and represents their optimal growth pattern (Fenton, 2003). In addition, they aid in the categorization of preterm infants as small for gestational age (SGA), large for gestational age (LGA), or appropriate for gestational age (AGA). Currently, there are multiple growth charts to choose from; each slightly varying in the way they classify preterm infants. This is troublesome, because it is vital to correctly classify a preterm infant. When incorrectly categorized, infants may not receive the necessary nutritional treatment, which can lead to additional health related consequences (Olsen et al., 2015). The aim of this study was to compare how curves developed from different populations classify male and female infants when stratified by sex, and gestational age. Our study is based on an initial sample of 357,289 infants admitted over a 3 year period ranging from 2013 to 2016. Our sample was restricted to 299,408 inborn infants admitted within 2 days of birth. In addition, infants were excluded if they had missing gestational age, missing gender, all missing measurements or were transferred. With all exclusion criteria in place, the final sample contained 258,510 infants ranging from 22 to 42 gestational weeks. The infants were then classified using the different percentile curve cut points as defined by Lubchenco, Olsen, Fenton, Villar and Yunis. SAS software was used for data processing and Tableau was used to create data visualization.
Academic department under which the project should be listed
CCSE - Data Science and Analytics
Primary Investigator (PI) Name
Dr. Lawson
Additional Faculty
Dr. Ferguson, Statistics and Analytical Sciences, afergu10@kennesaw.edu
A Comparison of Intrauterine Growth Chart’s Classification of Preterm Infants
Intrauterine growth charts are a visual representation of a cross section of infants achieved size at birth and represents their optimal growth pattern (Fenton, 2003). In addition, they aid in the categorization of preterm infants as small for gestational age (SGA), large for gestational age (LGA), or appropriate for gestational age (AGA). Currently, there are multiple growth charts to choose from; each slightly varying in the way they classify preterm infants. This is troublesome, because it is vital to correctly classify a preterm infant. When incorrectly categorized, infants may not receive the necessary nutritional treatment, which can lead to additional health related consequences (Olsen et al., 2015). The aim of this study was to compare how curves developed from different populations classify male and female infants when stratified by sex, and gestational age. Our study is based on an initial sample of 357,289 infants admitted over a 3 year period ranging from 2013 to 2016. Our sample was restricted to 299,408 inborn infants admitted within 2 days of birth. In addition, infants were excluded if they had missing gestational age, missing gender, all missing measurements or were transferred. With all exclusion criteria in place, the final sample contained 258,510 infants ranging from 22 to 42 gestational weeks. The infants were then classified using the different percentile curve cut points as defined by Lubchenco, Olsen, Fenton, Villar and Yunis. SAS software was used for data processing and Tableau was used to create data visualization.