Enteral Feed Is A Poor Source of Substrates For Endogenous Nitric Oxide Production In Preterm Infants – A Pilot Study

Abstract

Background: Bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD) prevalence has increased with an increase in the survival of premature infants (PI). BPD associated PH (BP-PH) occurs in 1/4th of the infants with BPD due to high pulmonary vascular resistance (PVR). The endogenous NO production helps with decreasing the PVR. L-arginine (Arg) and L-citrulline (Cit) helps with the production of endogenous nitric oxide (NO). We speculate PI with BPD needs more NO to reduce PVR compared to infants without BPD which makes Arg/Cit as a semi-essential amino acid in infants with BPD-PH. TPN contains …