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- Title
Birth Weight Ratio as an Alternative to Birth Weight Percentile to Express Infant Weight in Research and Clinical Practice: A Nationwide Cohort Study.
- Authors
Voskamp, Bart Jan; Kazemier, Brenda M.; Schuit, Ewoud; Mol, Ben Willem J.; Buimer, Maarten; Pajkrt, Eva; Ganzevoort, Wessel
- Abstract
Objective. To compare birth weight ratio and birth weight percentile to express infant weight when assessing pregnancy outcome. Study Design. We performed a national cohort study. Birth weight ratio was calculated as the observed birth weight divided by the median birth weight for gestational age. The discriminative ability of birth weight ratio and birth weight percentile to identify infants at risk of perinatal death (fetal death and neonatal death) or adverse pregnancy outcome (perinatal death + severe neonatal morbidity) was compared using the area under the curve. Outcomes were expressed stratified by gestational age at delivery separate for birth weight ratio and birth weight percentile. Results. We studied 1,299,244 pregnant women, with an overall perinatal death rate of 0.62%. Birth weight ratio and birth weight percentile have equivalent overall discriminative performance for perinatal death and adverse perinatal outcome. In late preterm infants (33+0-36+6 weeks), birth weight ratio has better discriminative ability than birth weight percentile for perinatal death (0.68 versus 0.63, P 0.01) or adverse pregnancy outcome (0.67 versus 0.60, P < 0.001). Conclusion. Birthweight ratio is a potentially valuable instrument to identify infants at risk of perinatal death and adverse pregnancy outcome and provides several advantages for use in research and clinical practice. Moreover, it allows comparison of groups with different average birth weights.
- Subjects
BIRTH weight; CLINICAL trials; COHORT analysis; HEALTH outcome assessment; FETAL death; PREGNANCY complications
- Publication
Obstetrics & Gynecology International, 2014, p1
- ISSN
1687-9589
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1155/2014/749476