Report of Newborn deaths at Post-delivery care facilities in 2001 and 2002.

Korean J Leg Med. 2002 May;26(1):33-46. Korean.

Department of Forensic Medicine, National Institute of Scientific Investigation, Seoul, Korea.

Yonsei Park 's Pediatric Clinic, Shiheung dong, Keumchun Ku, Seoul, Korea.

Department of Forensic Medicine, Catholic University Medical School, Seoul, Korea.

National Institute of Health, Seoul, Korea. ykmoo@mogaha.go.kr

The increase in number of nuclear families and double-income families contributed to the birth of many post-delivery care facilities, and this trend also bolstered such facilities that are not registered as a medical institution to provide post-delivery care to group of infants and new mothers. The fear of anthrax that hit America after the September 11 Attack has attributed to aggravation of the fear of virus in Korea, and the cause of infant deaths at post-delivery care facilities drew unprecedented public attention. In this context, it would be worth to note the cause of infant deaths in six cases that took place in October and November of 2001, March of 2002 at post-delivery care facilities. The age of the victims were 11 days(twin boys), 17 days(girl), 21 days(girl), 15 days(girl), 14 days(girl) and 14 days(boy). The circumstances under which those infants died were varied, but with a exception of one infant, all were presumed to have suffered from diarrhea at the facilities, and were brought to hospitals after suffering from respiratory difficulties only after care providers suspected more serious medical problems than initial thought. The first two autopsies indicated positive for rotavirus test. Autopsies of all cases except one reveal no specific findings that are noteworthy. One case shows global ischemic myocardial necrosis and pneumonia. In five cases where the amount of feeding was tracked down, the less than normal amount of feeding and the slower than normal body-weight increase were noted that lasted for several days before deaths. It is our opinion that even healthy infants in a group care facility require a higher standard of sanitation to prevent various infection and that the use of measurement that easily indicates the correlation between the amount of feeding and the body-weight increase will be helpful to prevent deaths from virus infection at group care type of post-delivery facilities.

Key words: post-delivery care facility, newborn death, diarrhea, rotavirus, astrovirus