Body temperature in premature infants during the first week of life: Exploration using infrared thermal imaging.

BACKGROUND: Hypothermia is a problem for very premature infants after birth and leads to increased morbidity and mortality. Previously we found very premature infants exhibit abnormal thermal patterns, keeping foot temperatures warmer than abdominal temperatures for their first 12h of life.

PURPOSE: We explored the utility of infrared thermography as a non-invasive method for measuring body temperature in premature infants in an attempt to regionally examine differential temperatures.

RESULTS: Our use of infrared imaging to measure abdominal and foot temperature for extremely premature infants in heated, humid incubators was successful and in close agreement using Bland and Altman technique with temperatures measured by skin thermistors.

CONCLUSIONS: Our study methods demonstrated that it was feasible to capture full body temperatures of extremely premature infants while they were resting in a heated, humid incubator using a Flir SC640 infrared camera. This technology offers researchers and clinicians a method to examine acute changes in perfusion differentials in premature infants which may lead to morbidity.