ArticleArchives of disease in childhood. Fetal and neonatal edition2025
Postnatal betamethasone treatment in extremely preterm infants and risk of neurodevelopmental impairment: a cohort study.
Article in Archives of disease in childhood. Fetal and neonatal edition, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.
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Who cites it
3 citing papers in PubMed.
- Transcriptomic Challenges We Faced with Animal Models for Neurological Disorders.Current issues in molecular biology · 2026Review
- Hydrocortisone use in France: current practices in 2026.European journal of pediatrics · 2026Article
- Prenatal Melatonin Therapy Enhances Postnatal Lung Development in a Mouse Model of Inflammation-Induced Preterm Birth.Antioxidants (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Article
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Authors and funding
8 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectiveTo evaluate if postnatal treatment with betamethasone in extremely preterm infants was associated with neurodevelopmental impairment (NDI) at 6.5 years of age.
designProspective cohort study.
settingExtremely Preterm Infants in Sweden Study (gestational age <27 weeks, born 2004-2007). PATIENTS: 428 children born extremely preterm were assessed at 6.5 years of age, 115 treated with betamethasone and 313 not treated.
main outcome measuresNDI at 6.5 years of age. Evaluation at 6.5 years included cognitive testing with the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-Fourth Edition (WISC-IV), neurological examination and a medical record review. EXPOSURE: Treatment with postnatal betamethasone. MAIN OUTCOME: Moderate to severe NDI at 6.5 years of age, defined as a composite including cerebral palsy, and/or impairment in cognition, hearing and vision.
resultsModerate to severe NDI was more prevalent in children treated with postnatal betamethasone (49% treated vs 26% not treated, p<0.001). Betamethasone-treated children had worse cognitive development with mean WISC-IV score of 75 (SD 13.7) vs 87 (SD 14.0, p<0.001). The effect was dose dependent: 1.35 mg/kg vs 1.0 mg/kg (p=0.01) in betamethasone-treated children with moderate to severe versus no or mild NDI, respectively. The differences remained after adjustment for potential confounders with logistic regression (adjusted OR (aOR) 1.80, 95% CI 1.14 to 3.21). The difference in NDI also remained after propensity score matching, with crude OR 2.82 (95% CI 1.42 to 5.61, p=0.003) and aOR 2.17 (95% CI 1.07 to 4.69, p=0.04).
conclusionPostnatal treatment with betamethasone is associated with increased risk of NDI at 6.5 years.
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