Hypebillirubimea and hypoglucemia ?? HELP PLEASE

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Baby boy. Billirubin is 218 and 232 on third and fourth days. He was tachypnic but his oxygen saturation was OK (98-99) and he lost 15-20% of his weight in 3 days. He didn't receive any phototherapy and was discharged on 7th day after his birth. No follow up appntment was made to check his billirubin level. His lowest glucose level was 2.6 from Lab reports and 1.3 Met (I am reading from the report and don't know what Met means). I didn't get any IV glucose, only feeding formula and breast milk. Now this boy is 3 and he is developmentally delayed - special needs child (mental retardation-speech, motor, academically) with no family history of any types of mental or physical disorders. Could that be he had kernicterus ? Did the personnel made a mistake? At what point they should give him glucose IV?

Thanks

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Specializes in NICU, PICU, educator.

Those numbers don't seem right. Why are you asking?

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I am asking because it's about my son. I always think what actually happened to my son. His delay wasn't that noticable until 2 and a half. We alsways thought every baby different and he will catch up but now there is no question - he is very different. The delivery was hard on him. Then, at eight months he had to have an x-ray for something else and it showed enlarged liver. I wonder if he had kernicterus. I had no idea about the danger of billirubin but I didn't skip any well-being appointment. Dr. didn't take a blood test for billirubin but I know he was yellow because my friends were joking at it.

The numbers are from his chart. I requested a copy of the chart from his hospital. Different hospitals use different measure units. 170 of billirubin equals 12, 260=15, 310=18 and so on. I don't know what is Met but it's on his chart under "diabetes protocol chart"

Do they do phototherapy for babies with high respiratory rate?

thanks

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You need to talk to your doctor or a doctor in your area who can review the delivery notes and the chart. Info on a bb about such a matter is just not reliable, especially if you aren't sure what the numbers are or mean or what the protocols of the hospital are.

I will tell you we don't place babies under photo for tachypnea and those numbers don't seem excessively high to me for a baby that big and that old (whether or not a bili is high enough to need photo depends on the size of the baby and its age). I believe even PICK (a group for parents of infants and children with kernicterus) doesn't even advise parents to demand photo unless it's over 15 and they are pretty agressive. Whether we give an IV bolus for a low sugar depends on how the baby responds to feeding. If we can just feed him more and his sugar comes up to appropriate levels we don't bolus.

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Thanks for your reply.

(I know resp rate increase when baby crying and so I thought they didn't put him in therapy because of his tachypnea. sorry, I didn't verbalize it right in my msg.)

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Specializes in NICU, PICU, educator.

I agree with Fergus...I had no idea what those numbers meant, like you said, each hospital uses different numbers.

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