Effect of delayed umbilical cord clamping on ferritin contents in sera from full-term infants aged 0, 3 and 6 months of life

Abstract

This study assessed the effect of delayed umbilical cord clampling on ferritin contents in serum samples from full-term infants aged 0, 3 and 6 months. This study was carried out at the Obstetric Center of the University Hospital of Santa Maria, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil, from May 2008 to April 2009. 101 full-term newborns were divided into two groups: early cord clamp – from 0 second to 1 minute after birth (n = 41); and late cord clamp – from 1 to 3 minutes after birth (n = 60). Venous blood samples were collected from infants at the 1st life day, and at 3rd and 6th months. The results were analyzed by Statsoft Statistica v. 7.0 6.1.0 EN. The tests ‘Qui-square’, ‘U Mann Whitney’ and Spearman’s correlation were used for statistical analyses. The mean values of ferritin in the 3rd and 6th months samples showed to be superior in infants of the late clamping group (111.82 ng/mL and 33.19 ng/mL, respectively) than in samples from children of early clamping group (97.79 ng/mL e 24.81 ng/mL). These findings evidenced an alternative for a sustainable intervention, safe and of low cost to integrate programs which aim at the reduction of iron deficiency anemia in infants, mainly in developing countries.