Nusrat Zareen, Muhammad Saleem Khanzada, Rukhsana Rubeen, Zakir Jalal Khanzada, Syed Touseef Ahmed, Shaheen Sharaf Shah, Syed Saud Hasan.
Lactic acid and pH levels as the authentic and reliable diagnostic tools for the assessment of the fetal acidemia.
J Liaquat Uni Med Health Sci Jan ;6(3):116-9.

OBJECTIVE: To identify the importance of acidemia in distressed neonates with its diagnosis on confirmative basis and to evaluate its severity by the estimation of lactic acid (LA), pH, bicarbonate (HCO-3) ions and hemoglobin (Hb) in comparison to subjective criteria like Apgar score (0 –10), fetal heart rate 120-160 beats per minute and meconium staining of liquor which provides vague diagnosis. METHODS: This study was conducted at Basic Medical Sciences Institute, located at Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre Karachi, Sindh – Pakistan. It comprised of 40 full term neonates with acidemia without any other co-morbidity and 40 matching controls. RESULTS: In this study, fetal arterial blood acid base analysis showed that LA levels were significantly high (P=0.001) and pH, HCO3- and Hb levels were significantly low (P=0.001) in acidotic neonates as compared to controls. CONCLUSION: High LA levels with decreased pH, HCO3- and Hb are associated with acidemia in newborns, which reveal confirmative diagnosis with comparison to subjective criteria for diagnosis of acidemia.

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