Delayed cord clamping could reduce risk of premature infant death by 66%
The authors said that, worldwide, almost 13m babies are born prematurely every year and close to one 1m die shortly after birth.
Waiting for at least two minutes to clamp the umbilical cord of premature babies could decrease that child’s risk of death by as much as two-thirds, two new studies published in have found.
The research, which included data from trials at Cork University Maternity Hospital, found that the risk of death may be reduced by as much as two-thirds when waiting at least two minutes compared to immediately clamping the cord.
The authors said that, worldwide, almost 13m babies are born prematurely every year and close to one 1m die shortly after birth.
Irish Centre for Maternal and Child Health Research (INFANT) in University College Cork chair in Neonatology Professor Eugene Dempsey, said the results of the study were significant.
"Until recently, the standard practice was to clamp the umbilical cord immediately after birth for premature babies,” he said.
After a baby is born, a midwife or obstetrician will put a clamp on the umbilical cord about 3cm to 4cm from the belly button, before the cord is then cut.
“There are no nerve endings in the cord so this procedure is not painful for you or your baby,” advice on the matter on the HSE website says.
“Your baby’s umbilical cord stump will fall off by itself about 5 to 15 days after birth.”
The HSE advice says that the umbilical cord will be clamped and cut after two minutes or after it has stopped pulsating.
When the cord is cut, it will leave a small stump on the baby where it has been cut which must receive special care until it falls off.
For the study, the research from Cork was pooled in with the major international iCOMP collaboration which looked at clinical trial data and the outcomes of thousands of premature babies across the world.
The first study, which used data from 3,292 infants across 21 studies, found that delayed clamping of the umbilical cord, clamped 30 seconds or more after birth, reduced the risk of death in premature babies compared to those whose umbilical cord was clamped immediately after birth.
In this instance, the deferred clamping likely reduced the risk of death in premature babies by a third compared to immediate clamping.
The second study, on a larger scale, looked at data from 47 clinical trials involving 6,094 babies. This one compared different durations of delay, and found that the longer the delay in clamping the greater the likely benefit.
“Waiting two or more minutes to clamp the cord had a 91% probability of being the best treatment to prevent death shortly after birth,” the research said.
“In comparison, immediate clamping had a very low probability of being the best treatment for preventing death in premature babies.”
It added that in infants that require immediate resuscitation, these findings may only be relevant in such situations where there are provisions for such care with the cord contact.
INFANT Centre director Professor Geraldine Boylan said: “The high-impact findings published in emphasise the importance of global collaborative research and clearly demonstrates the impact of clinical trials on neonatal care and outcomes for premature babies.”
