Study of evoked potentials and early development in premature infants

TL;DR

This study explores how evoked potentials in premature infants may help predict their early neurodevelopmental outcomes.

Contribution

The study identifies a specific link between visual evoked potentials and motor function outcomes in preterm infants.

Findings

Visual evoked potential latency correlated with Gross Motor Function Measure scores in preterm infants.

No significant differences in EP results were found between groups with different HINE scores.

Combining visual EP latency with other factors could improve developmental outcome predictions.

Abstract

Evoked potentials have been suggested as potential biomarkers for predicting neurodevelopment. This study aimed to investigate the relationship between evoked potentials (EP) and neurodevelopmental outcomes in preterm infants.

Premature infants admitted to the neonatal intensive care unit of a tertiary referral hospital between March 2020 and March 2023 were included in the study. Among them, only those with EP at a corrected age of 40 weeks were included, meanwhile, infants who did not undergo the test or had abnormal results were excluded. Additionally, patients with follow-up developmental outcomes such as the Hammersmith Infant Neurological Examination (HINE) at 3 months corrected age or the Gross Motor Function Measure (GMFM) at 6 months corrected age were included.

A total of 24 participants were included in this study. No significant differences in the clinical factors and results of the EP studies were observed between the two groups divided by a HINE score of 60. Hierarchical logistic regression analysis revealed that visual EP was the only factor that correlated with the lying and rolling domains of the GMFM (P = 0.028).

A significant association was observed between the GMFM and visual EP. Integrating the visual EP latency with other parameters may improve clinical assessments to predict developmental outcomes, possibly improving the accuracy of medical interventions and patient outcomes.

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