Efficacy of an Oral Stimulation Protocol in Preterm Infants to Shorten the Period Between Enteral and Oral Nutrition

Efficacy of a Manual Oral Stimulation Protocol in Preterm Infants to Shorten the Period Between Enteral and Oral Nutrition

Oral feeding in the neonatal period requires an accurate coordination between suction, swallowing and breathing. In premature new-borns and, depending on their gestational age, the coordinated work of those processes becomes jeopardised, being necessary to begin with an artificial enteral feeding. This situation results in lengthen their stay at the hospital until they are able to respond in a reliable way to their nutritional requirements orally, maintaining an adequate daily weight gain and without endangering their cardiorespiratory system.

This project is an experimental, prospective, blinded, randomized study, aimed to determine whether the application of a manual oral stimulation protocol in premature infants, hospitalized in a neonatal unit, reduces the transition time from enteral feeding to oral full feeding, while improves quality of feeding and shortens hospitalization time.

Inclusion Criteria:

• Babies between 25 + 0 to 30 + 6 weeks of gestation according to the last menstruation, with adequate weight and size for their gestational age, who are receiving orogastric tube feeding, presenting clinical hemodynamic and cardiorespiratory stability and without any associated pathology.

Exclusion Criteria:

• Babies with congenital anomalies that affect feeding (chromosomopathies, craniofacial anomalies, severe esophageal or tracheal atresia, or any other that affect feeding),
• Babies with abnormalities that alter digestive function such as "necrotizing enterocolitis".
• Babies with other abnormalities that alter hemodynamic or cardiorespiratory stability, that present severe sepsis or positive meningitis culture, that suffer from chronic medical complications such as severe bronchopulmonary dysplasia, grade III or IV intraparaventricular hemorrhage, periventricular leukomalacia, etc.,
• Inability to to assign an exact gestational age.