Probiotics Decrease Preterm Infant Deaths, But Not Risks of Necrotizing Enterocolitis: Study

Hospitals often give premature infants probiotics to help assist them in developing proper digestive functions.

Neonatal Intensive Care units (NICU) that give probiotics to premature infants experience less fatalities than hospitals that do not use the supplements, according to the findings of a new study.

Probiotics are live organisms that are often introduced to the gut to help aid with digestion and other health issues, and they have been increasingly given to premature infants to improve and restore the gut microbiota, which provides certain health benefits..

However, in findings published in the medical journal Pediatrics on February 12, researchers indicate that probiotics do not appear to decrease the incidents of necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC) among premature infants, which is a devastating disorder that results in inflammation and death of intestinal tissues.

Premature infants face a particularly high risk of NEC, which can result in symptoms like bloating, green-tinged vomiting and bloody stools. The condition often results in the need for emergency surgery while the baby is still in the NICU, and many premature infants do not survive NEC.

Amid growing awareness about the causes of NEC in recent years, health experts have been searching for ways to reduce the risk of premature infants developing the condition. Most efforts have been focused on promoting breast feeding over the use of cow’s milk-based infant formula products, like Similac and Enfamil, which have been found to dramatically increase the risk of NEC.

As a result of the formula makers’ failure to disclose these risks to parents and medical providers, several thousand families are now NEC infant formula lawsuits, alleging that a desire for profits was placed before the health and safety of premature babies, with the makers of Enfamil and Similac actually promoting specific variations of their products for use among these vulnerable infants.

In this new study, a group of Canadian researchers attempted to determine whether the use of probiotics may be an effective means of reducing the risk of NEC or early death for preterm infants.

Researchers looked at data on more than 32,000 preterm infants. They compared outcomes between those who were given probiotics and those who were not in 33 Canadian Neonatal Network units from January 1, 2016, to December 31, 2022, in an attempt to determine if probiotics helped with the survival of infants born before 34 weeks gestation who weighed less than 1,000 grams.

According to their findings, infants given probiotics experienced decreased mortality rates. However, the researchers also discovered that there were no decreased rates of NEC or late-onset sepsis among those children.

While incidents of sepsis, a condition where the body’s immune system overreacts to an infection, are rare in connection with probiotics, researchers believe that probiotics contributed to at least two infant deaths.

“Probiotics used in Canadian neonatal units were associated with decreased mortality in infants born before 34 weeks’ gestation and with a birth weight less than 1000 g with limited effects on NEC and late-onset sepsis,” the researchers concluded. “Probiotic sepsis was rare.”