Neonatal surgery
380 g
The weight of the smallest baby to have abdominal surgery in a study at one UK hospital.
About four packs of instant noodles. A pack of instant noodles is usually about 90 g.
At 24 weeks of pregnancy, a baby's foot is about 4.4 cm long. Shorter than two £1 coins side by side.
- 73% of babies under 1 kg at the time of their operation survived to go home.
- Half of the survivors had no recorded long-term problems at 2 years.
- More than half (56%) needed surgery for necrotising enterocolitis (NEC), where the bowel becomes inflamed and starts to die. It is the most common gut emergency in premature babies.
Source: Awolaran et al, Pediatr Surg Int 2022 · Chitty and Altman, BJOG 2002
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