SYNLAB UK/Synnovis
What inspired your research and what did it cover?
Vitamin K deficiency bleeding is a devastating disease that is preventable by routine prophylactic vitamin K at birth. For preterm babies, by the time they are discharged from hospital to go home, the protection offered by prophylactic vitamin K has diminished which means the baby is reliant on getting sufficient vitamin K from their diet. Breast milk has a low vitamin K content which in exclusively or predominately breast-fed babies might not be protective against deficiency. The research was led by my long-standing collaborators who have witnessed the consequences of vitamin K deficiency bleeding for babies and their families. Our laboratories were able to help provide compelling biochemical evidence of subclinical vitamin deficiency in babies included in this study.
Looking at the potential of your findings, what difference can they make?
In the UK, preterm babies are currently given multivitamin supplements through infancy which include vitamins A, some of the Bs, C and D. No vitamin K is included. The addition of vitamin K should prevent vitamin K deficiency bleeding in otherwise-healthy breastfed infants. This would potentially save lives. I would like to empathise the collaborative nature of the study and the leadership and expertise shown by all the authors and by Profs. Paul Clarke and Martin Shearer in particular. Synnovis are now collaborating with the father of the boy who tragically died to make biomarkers of vitamin K status more widely available internationally.
Exclusively breastmilk-fed preterm infants are at high risk of developing subclinical vitamin K deficiency despite intramuscular prophylaxis at birth
National Library of Medicine – https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/36087073/
There is near-global consensus that all newborns be given parenteral vitamin K1 (VK1 ) at birth as prophylaxis against VK deficiency bleeding (VKDB). Breastmilk has a low VK content and cases of late VKDB are reported in exclusively breastmilk-fed preterm infants despite VK prophylaxis at birth.
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