Body Surface Area

[JACK]

Do you calculate BSA for your neonates? Which neonates are indicated for calculation of BSA? What formula do you use?

(Some related references:

http://www.fmhs.uaeu.ac.ae/neonatal/iss004/p5.pdf

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18298786?ordinalpos=1&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_DefaultReportPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum)

[Stefan Johansson]

Must admit that we use weight as the correcting factor (/kg) when it comes to medications at least.

A few years we had an extremely preterm infant with Hemophagocytic lymphohistiocytosis (HLH) who were treated with cytostatic drugs. If I recall this correctly, the pediatric oncologists calculated doses by body surface area.

This is a bit off-topic, but this case was published:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17888050

[JACK]

the pediatric oncologists calculated doses by body surface area.

...

Thanks for the link

Do you remember which formula they used in that case?

Did they use the BSA as derived from weight only as mentioned in this article http://www.nature.com/bjc/journal/v85/n1/pdf/6691859a.pdf ? Or did they take both weight and length into calculation?

[Stefan Johansson]

I am sorry but I do not know.

However, this infant was critically ill, and I would guess that we did not have a valid recording of the body length. So, my guess is that weight was used to derive BSA.