I am interested in pulse oxymetri screening, but we do not perform such screening in our maternity units. Yesterday, a Swedish group published in BMJ, a large screening study including almost 40.000 infants. It seems that the article is available in free full text format here!

My question to you is... since this method has been discussed for a pretty long time now - do you already now perform pulse oxymetri screening before routine discharge of well babies? If yes, what is your experience?

We use pulse-oximetry screening in the maternity wards in the hospital of Västerås, Sweden since about half a year or so.

We adopted this method since earlier studies had suggested better sensitivity with a combination of pulse-oximetry and clinical examination than the latter one alone. As mentioned in the article above you also have a better possibility to find non-cardiac problems (causing a lowered oxygen saturation)

As far as I know, in Västerås it has´nt meant an increased amount of echocardiography.

A couple of babies with infection and pulmonary hypertension was discovered this way. I´m not completely updated on cardiac malformations, also I think we have too few patients in this group.

Edited June 1, 200915 yr by Urban Rosenqvist

We don't do it unfortunately - even though we have echo service at our hospital. I guess our level of evidence is still on this level. Interestingly all children with CHD could be detected clinically in this study, I am not sure if that would apply to many other hospitals around the world...