A Descriptive Study on Management of Neonatal Jaundice in Children Hospital Lahore

Abstract

Introduction:Jaundice is a common and usually harmless condition in newborn babies, which refers to the yellow colour of the skin and whites of the eyes that happens when there is too much bilirubin in the blood. Bilirubin is a pigment produced by your baby’s red blood cells. Lack of uniform guidelines and standard practice parameters for diagnosis and management of neonatal jaundice often leads many babies to develop unnoticed hyperbilirubinemia causing kernicterus and long term poor neurological sequlae.Objective: What are the techniques/medical treatment adopted in the children’s hospital, Lahore to manage the neonatal jaundice? Materials & methods: 100 babies with neonatal jaundice was considered for the research work. Self-structures questionnaires and convenient sampling techniques were adopted to collect the data from the participants.Results: The total outcome of the study revealed that there were 100 neonates with an average age of X̅= 2.47 days; standard deviation= 0.9, indicating that neonatal jaundice occurred most frequently between 1 and 7 days after birth. The average maternal age was X̅=27.68 years old, with a standard deviation of 3.68. Neonatal jaundice affects 62% of preterm newborns with low birth weight. While nursing had a p<0.05 relationship with the prevalence of NNJ. In the hospital, 80 percent of non-breastfed newborns were diagnosed with neonatal jaundice. There was an association between Apgar score and NNJ. The result showed a corresponding increase in the occurrence of NNJ as the Apgar score decreases. Phototherapy was found to be a more accurate technique for surviving newborns with NNJ, with a survival percentage of 95.65%. Conclusion: Literally, Antenatal and neonatal care should be improved and supported by all health care stakeholders if child millennium development goals would be achieved.

Keywords:Neonatal jaundice, Pakistan, management, phototherapy, Intensive phototherapy, EBT, pre-term, term, American Academy of Pediatrics, hyperbilirubinaemia, glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase (G6PD),  NH (Neonatal hyperbilirubinaemia), neonates, findings, neonatal ward etc.   

DOI: 10.7176/JHMN/110-02

Publication date:August 31^st 2023