We are starting to make babies in our NICU NPO during blood transfusions to reduce the risk of NEC. Does anyone have any opinions on this matter, or follow the same practice?

Could you explain what "NPO" means?

Sure, I'm sorry. NPO means nothing to eat either by mouth or NG tube.

We do not change feeding during transfusions.

We also don't. And we do not observe higher incidence of NEC that could be connected with feeding during blood transfusion.

we dont stop feeding during transfusions

As far as I know there is no evidence that keeping babies NPO during blood transfusion will reduce the incidence of NEC. Are you intersted in doing a RCT? do you have some lab animal data or observational studies?

We continue feeds.

And btw , what is the theoretical background for not feeding the baby during blood transfusion? I mean, why should it cause NEC?

We continue to feed babies during a blood transfusion also. As far as I know there is no reason why the baby should develop NEC. However, if the baby is being transfused for increasing apneas and bradys and is unwell, we do check the crypt antigen status before transfusing, since a positive crypt antigen can indicate that the baby already has NEC.

Joan