Abstract

VILLEGAS BECERRIL, E; FERNANDEZ MOLINA, F; GONZALEZ, R  and  GALLARDO GALERA, JM. Serum IGF-I levels in retinopathy of prematurity. New indications for ROP screening. Arch Soc Esp Oftalmol [online]. 2005, vol.80, n.4, pp.233-238. ISSN 0365-6691.

Objective: To determine the IGF-I serum levels in premature infants with the objective of being able to use these levels as an indicator of the need for exploration in a screening program for retinopathy of prematurity (ROP). Methods: This was a comparative study in which IGF-I levels were measured in every infants’ serum during the first exploration in the 4 to 6 postnatal weeks. The degree of ROP and a variety of morbidity factors were evaluated, including the presence of intraventricular haemorrhage, sepsis, need for blood transfusion and the number of days of mechanical ventilation. Results: The average IGF-I values during the first 4 to 6 postnatal weeks were lowest in the ROP cases (10.75 µg/L SD 16.053) while the NO-ROP cases yielded higher values (29.75 µg/L, SD 13.022). The Mann-Whitney U test showed a value of P for the IGF-I values of 0.004, indicating significant differences between the groups with or without ROP. Conclusions: The low IGF-I serum levels in ROP infants in comparison with the NO-ROP cases, suggest that this marker could be used as an indicator in the screening for ROP.

Keywords : Retinopathy; prematurity; insulin-like growth factor; ROP.