日本未熟児新生児学会雑誌　第21巻　第2号　61～66頁（2009年）

日本未熟児新生児学会雑誌　21(2)：237-242；2009　

受付日：June．30．2008

受理日：Nov．05．2008

Measuring Left and Right Pulmonary Arteries Blood Flow Rates of a Premature Neonate

Department of Pediatrics, The Jikei University School of Medicine

Tatsuo NAGASHIMA・Masahisa KOBAYASHI・Satoshi TERAMOTO・Erika OKANO・Junko KAWANO・Hiroyuki IDA

Key Words：Ductus Arteriosus，Patent，Infant，Premature，Pulmonary artery，Regional blood flow，Echocardiography

OBJECTIVE：To focus on the rates of blood flow through the left and right pulmonary arteries as a possibly more useful indicator of patent ductus arteriosus in premature neonates. METHODS：The Doppler-derived blood flow rate can be calculated with： Q （mL/kg/min） = meanVelocity × circular cross-sectional Area × 60 ÷ body weight A CASE：A male neonate was born at 26 gestational weeks with 705 g who underwent 2 courses of indomethacin treatment that administered 3 doses of 0.1 mg/kg at intervals of 12 hours, and an operation of ligation. CONCLUSIONS：Measuring the rates of blood flow in the left and right pulmonary arteries of a premature neonate has three advantages as a new index for evaluating patent ductus arteriosus. First：displaying echocardiographic images of the location where blood flow is measured is easy. Second：the difference is slight between the angle of incidence of the ultrasound signal and the directions of blood flow in the left and right pulmonary arteries. Third：it is easy to interpret the amount of left-to-right shunt flow through ductus arteriosus because the rates are measured at more-peripheral sites of the main pulmonary artery, where the ductus arteriosus opens and where blood flow has already been affected by the amount of left-to-right shunt flow through ductus arteriosus. We plan to collect data of additional premature neonates so that we can establish the rates of blood flow through the left and right pulmonary arteries as an efficient indicator for the treatment of patent ductus arteriosus.