Preterm infants are often put into incubators to keep them warm, helping their survival and well-being. But a recent episode of Radio NZ National's Our Changing World asked if cooling down pre-term babies suffering from brain injury could actually be beneficial – and stop the likelihood of injuries developing further.
Gravida Principal Investigator Professor Alistair Gunn, from the Department of Physiology at , was interviewed on the show on 14 March 2013 on new research with co-researcher Dr Laura Bennet into ways to use cooling (carefully induced hypothermia) and stem cell methods to stop the spread of hypoxia (peri-natal brain injury caused by pre-birth oxygen deprivation) in pre-term babies.
Prof Gunn, who previously was part of a research group that invented a cool cap for babies, is extending his original research that has helped full term babies who were treated with cooling methods in the first few hours of their life to experience reduced likelihood of further injuries developing. In this new investigation, Prof Gunn and Laura Bennet are looking at how cooling supplemented by stem cell support may somehow help a pre-term baby repair damaged cells. The research is showing how critical it is to know the timing of injury and whether an infant is within the “window of opportunity” for treatment.
This interview, Cooling and Preterm Babies, can be heard on the Radio NZ National website.