Active clinical trials for "Premature Birth"

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.

To date, it is largely unknown whether preterm children experience balance problems and whether they have normal postural control. Assuming that postural adaptation is affected after preterm delivery because it depends on attention and fine motor control, the postural control and motor development of children born preterm less than 32 weeks in the 5-7 age period will be affected compared to their healthy controls. Identifying these situations according to their healthy peers will improve the general health of premature births and enable better intervention methods to be designed.

The aims of the study are to evaluate the rate of ESBL-producing Enterobacteriaceae colonization among women in preterm labor and term labor, the incidence of maternal vertical transmission of ESBL, and the clinical significance of ESBL in preterm infants.

If the investigators could prove that three -dimensional ultrasound measurement of fetal adrenal gland volume can accurately predict the likelihood of preterm birth in patients having symptoms and signs of PTL , they would be able to use it as a valuable component for assessment and early management of high risk pregnant women for PTB which can be positively reflected on the risk of neonatal morbidity and mortality in those patients.

5D and 2D ultrasound will be done for pregnant women within 72hours before preterm delivery to determine estimated fetal weight by ultrasound. The estimated fetal weight by 5D and 2D ultrasound will be compared to the actual birth weight to determine accuracy of 5D ultrasound in predicting actual birth weight .

Premature Ovarian Failure (POF), syndrome observed in young woman, present consequences on hormonal and leads at definitive infertility. It's a rare and complex syndrome and for this reason, we propose to initiate a collaborative team network to understand better his genetic and physiopathology. We are going to realize a global study of this syndrome with clinical and fundamentals approaches. We wish that this project allows us to understand better the physiopathology of this rare disease. Finally, POF responsible genes identification is the base for future development of therapeutics approaches.

Preterm infants often need peripheral artery catheters for invasive blood pressure recording and to facilitate blood sampling. Near infrared spectroscopy is a method to evaluate cerebral oxygenation and as well as cerebral blood flow. Sampling procedures with identical sampling volumes are performed at a short (40 seconds) and a long (70 seconds) time intervall while changes of cerebral oxygenation are measured. The investigators hypothesise that slower sampling decrease changes in cerebral blood flow.

Cerebral Palsy (CP) is a major developmental problem. Major risk groups of CP, are preterm infants and multiple pregnancies. Previous studies using the General Movements methodology demonstrated early identification of CP, as early as 3 month of age. This method was implemented mainly on preterm infants this study goal is to enlarge the scope of the methodology to infants of multiple pregnancies. A second goal is to study early motor development and its future consequences by comparing the development of the infants of the same multiple pregnancy.

To evaluate the contribution of internal and familial resources on the development of motherhood in a population of mothers having preterm twin infants and comparing this population to a population of mothers giving birth to single (or twins) full term infants.