Active clinical trials for "Premature Birth"

Premature ovarian failure (POF) is a rare condition, affecting 1 in 10,000 women before age 20 and 1 in 1,000 women before age 30. The two main causes of POF are congenital and acquired. Patients with POF who carry out the desire to have a child turn to medically assisted reproduction through oocyte donation or to adoption. The main endpoint of this study is to compare the desire to have children among women with premature ovarian failure (POF) aged 18 to 26 years vs. controls of the same age (stratified by age) without major menstruation disorder.

The aim of the current study is to assess the accuracy of maternal serum amyloid A for prediction of preterm labor in women with threatened preterm labor.

This study evaluates the perinatal factors influencing body composition at discharge in very preterm infants and the relationship between fat free mass and further neurocognitive development.

Precocious puberty - the onset of signs of puberty before 8 years of age in girls - is be physically and emotionally devastating for kids and is sometimes caused by an underlying and medical condition. One sign of precocious puberty in small girls is breast development (thelarche). This can persist without other physical changes of puberty, it may continue into precocious puberty, or it may disappear. This project will improve the diagnostics of precocious puberty in girls and improve our ability to identify which girls with thelarche, who will develop precocious puberty and need medical treatment.

This is a randomised controlled trial investigating the performance of two, 'state of the art' electric breast pumps in mothers who have delivered preterm infants. The main data collection period will be up to day 10 post delivery data. Data collected will include a record of the weight of milk produced during the first 10 days and a short questionnaire to find the mothers' opinions of the pumps used. On Day 5 a timed and weighed expression of 15 minutes will be carried out. After the first 10 days, mothers will be asked to collect brief information on their continuing use of their pumps and subsequent duration of breast and bottle feeding, mothers will be contacted at 3 and 6 months post-term

This study is evaluating whether a bedside brainwave monitor can be used to detect early brain injury in premature infants.

Transvaginal ultrasound of the cervix has become a common tool to evaluate patients who are at risk for preterm delivery. A shortened cervical length has been associated with an increased risk of preterm delivery. Dynamic cervical change is visible shortening(>6mm) of the cervix seen during the ultrasound examination. Prior studies have shown that the presence of dynamic change in patients with a shortened cervical length(<3cm) is not independently predictive of preterm delivery. However, a subset of patients with normal initial cervical length(>3cm) and dynamic change did demonstrate an increased rate of preterm delivery. Because this was a small sub-group, the present study was designed to obtain a larger sample size for further evaluation. The second focus of this study involves patients with a dilated cervix and whether cervical length adds predictive value to gestational age at delivery. Patients presenting to with symptomatic preterm labor(vaginal pressure or uterine contractions), who consent to the study, will undergo the standard evaluation for preterm labor(described in detail below.) The only additional evaluation is a prolonged transvaginal ultrasound of approximately 10 minutes to evaluate for the presence of dynamic change during a contraction. Null hypothesis: Symptomatic preterm labor patients, with normal initial cervical length(>3cm), who exhibit dynamic cervical change deliver at a gestational age equal to those without dynamic change. Alternative hypothesis: Symptomatic preterm labor patients, with normal initial cervical length(>3cm), who exhibit dynamic cervical change deliver at an earlier gestational age than those without dynamic change.

The purposes of this one-year follow-up study are twofold: (1) to prospectively examine the spontaneous kicking and the supported stepping movement in VLBW premature infants until attainment of independent walking; and (2) to assess factors (i.e. gross motor development, cardiopulmonary function, anthropometry, body composition and cognition) that could potentially influence walking attainment in VLBW premature infants.

Preterm infants are especially vulnerable to gut microbiota disruption and dysbiosis since their early gut microbiota is less abundant and diverse. Several factors may influence infants' microbiota such as mother's diet, mode of delivery, antibiotic exposure and type of feeding. The main goal of this observational study is to evaluate the impact of different types of feeding (breast milk, donor human milk and preterm formulas) on the intestinal microbiota of preterm infants hospitalized in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) of Maternidade Alfredo da Costa (MAC). Furthermore, the influence of mode of delivery and the mother's diet, among others factors, on vertical microbiota transmission will be evaluated. After delivery, mothers will be asked to collect their own fecal samples and will be invited to complete a semi-quantitative food frequency questionnaire. Stool samples will be collected from premature infants every 7 days. DNA will be extracted from fecal samples and different bacterial genus and species will be analyzed.

Preterm birth is a leading cause of neonatal mortality despite of numerous advances and intensive research in perinatal medicine. Almost one million children die every year due to the complications of preterm birth and rates are on the rise. Of the 14 million survivors per year, most face a lifetime of disability, including learning disabilities, visual and hearing impairments. The majority of preterm birth happen spontaneously (SPTD) which is often a multi factorial event, precocious cervical softening, shortening and dilatation are a common underlying factor. In the scope of this project the investigators propose to develop and clinically validate a new device, Cervix Monitor (CM), for detecting cervix conditions leading to SPTD and its risk assessment.