Background: After early studies suggested safety and potential for benefit of dexmedetomidine use in neonatal hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy (HIE), our neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) decided to transition from morphine to dexmedetomidine as our standard sedative during therapeutic hypothermia (TH). The primary aim was to monitor the possible side effects of transitioning from morphine to dexmedetomidine with a primary goal of reducing the days to initiation of enteral feeds to less than 3 days, with the hypothesis that the gastrointestinal motility effects of morphine may have been hindering feeding progress during TH. The secondary aim was to determine rates of hemodynamically significant bradycardia.
Methods: This was a prospective quality improvement study using a retrospective comparison group to determine the comfort, hemodynamic, and early feeding effects of a clinical change in sedation management from morphine to dexmedetomidine. We included infants born at ≥35 weeks of gestation receiving hypothermia for hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy (HIE) from 2017 to 2023.
Results: Data were collected from 107 infants: 48 morphine, 35 dexmedetomidine, and 24 neither. Heart rate was lower in the morphine and dexmedetomidine groups compared to no sedation. Blood pressures, pain scores, and blanket temperatures were not different between groups. Infants receiving dexmedetomidine initiated enteral feeds earlier than either of the other groups and reached full enteral feeds earlier than the no treatment group but not the morphine group.
Conclusions: This study supports a growing body of literature suggesting dexmedetomidine is a well-tolerated alternative to opioids during hypothermia for HIE.
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