What do we hope to find out?
1. To quantify survival to discharge from hospital and major complications of prematurity (Retinopathy of Prematurity, intra-cerebral haemorrhage, Chronic Lung Disease of Prematurity, laparotomy for NEC and/or perforation) in babies born before 27 completed weeks, by week of gestational age.
2. To compare outcomes for babies born <26 weeks gestational age in 2006 with those born in 1995.
3. To determine how problems before birth and management in labour influence condition at birth in those born before 27 completed weeks gestational age.
4. To establish whether predictors of death and poor neonatal outcomes in the 1995 cohort still hold and to identify other factors that determine these outcomes.
5. To find out how much the proportion of total births that are born alive and the proportion of livebirths admitted for intensive care at these gestational ages has changed since 1995 and to record significant changes in neonatal interventions.
The EPICure 2 team have been working very hard and data collection has now commenced. Information will be collected on babies born in 2006 throughout England and will finish when the last of the EPICure 2 babies is discharged from their Neonatal Unit.
All the information will then need to be analysed and the results will be published in medical journals and on the EPICure website