SEVERITY OF GROWTH-RETARDATION AND PHYSICAL CONDITION AT BIRTH IN SMALL-FOR-GESTATIONAL-AGE INFANTS

Ponderal index divides small for gestational age (SGA) infants into two categories, based upon proportional and disproportional growth retardation. The latter group supposedly suffered from unfavorable intrauterine conditions. The aim of the study was investigation of the value of the ponderal index in the discrimination of underlying fetal disorders and its dependency upon the severity of the intrauterine growth retardation (IUGR). In a cohort of 142 SGA infants we found 12 newborns with congenital anomalies; most of the newborns were disproportionally small. Fourteen newborns expired in the Neonatal Intensive-Care Unit for various reasons, in general not directly related with the IUGR. All of them were disproportionally small. The newborns were divided into two groups according to the severity of IUGR. Proportionality was independent of this severity, indicating that most SGA fetuses remain disproportionally small during long-standing IUGR. It is likely, however, that the proportionally small ones adjust better to the poor intrauterine conditions, since they all survived.