Hematologic Characteristics of Intrauterine Growth Restricted Small for Gestational Age Infants

ABSTRACT

PURPOSE: Intrauterine growth retardation (IUGR) is the term used to designate a fetus that has not reached its growth potential. However it is difficult to make a distinction between infants who are constitutionally small and growth restricted small. In the present study, we focused on the clinical characteristics and the hematologic value in small for gestational age (SGA) infants and discussed how to distinguish intrauterine growth restricted infants from constitutionally small infants. METHODS: SGA infants that did not have any other risk factors for IUGR in the medical record except maternal hypertension (HTN) and diabetes mellitus (DM) and born at the Seoul St Mary's Hospital and Yeouido St Mary's Hospital from January 2007 to July 2010 were included. The frequency of IUGR is higher in the pregnancy with medical problem, and in preterm infants. Therefore, the data was categorized by maternal disease and gestational age. We assessed the clinical data and the hematologic value. RESULTS: The leukocyte count and the platelet count were lower in the SGA with maternal HTN group and the preterm SGA group. There was no difference in the clinical data and the prognosis resulted from maternal HTN and maternal DM. However, the hematologic difference was not found in the categorization of the preterm SGA group as maternal diasease. CONCLUSION: The results of this study showed that it is possible the low leukocyte count and the low platelet count are the characteristic hematologic features in growth restricted small for gestational age infants.