Open AccessAbsorption spectra of early stool from preterm infants need to be considered in abdominal NIRS oximetry
Author(s) -
Helene Isler,
Daniel Schenk,
Jérôme Bernhard,
Stefan Kleiser,
Felix Scholkmann,
Draženka Ostojić,
Alexander Kalyanov,
Linda Ahnen,
M. Wolf,
Tanja Karen
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
biomedical optics express
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.362
H-Index - 86
ISSN - 2156-7085
DOI - 10.1364/boe.10.002784
Subject(s) - medicine , meconium , necrotizing enterocolitis , gastroenterology , pediatrics , pregnancy , biology , fetus , genetics
Necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC) is the most common gastrointestinal emergency of the preterm infant. Low abdominal tissue oxygen saturation (StO 2 ) measured by near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) oximetry may be an early sign of NEC relevant for treating or even preventing NEC. However, current commercial NIRS oximeters provide inaccurate StO 2 readings because they neglect stool as an abdominal absorber. To tackle this problem, we determined the optical properties of faeces of preterm infants to enable a correct abdominal StO 2 measurement. In 25 preterm born infants (median age 31 0/7 ± 2 1/7 weeks, weight 1478 ± 511 g), we measured their first five stool probes with a VIS/NIR spectrometer and calculated the optical properties using the Inverse Adding Doubling (IAD) method. We obtained two absorption spectra representing meconium and transitional stool . Probabilistic cluster analysis correctly classified 96 out of 107 stool probes. The faeces spectra need to be considered to enable correct abdominal StO 2 measurements with NIRS oximetry.