ABSTRACT
PURPOSE: The relationship between chest X-ray findings and respiratory indices, including the arterial-alveolar oxygen partial pressure ratio(a/APO2) and the ventilatory index(VI), indicators of the clinical respiratory status in neonates with respiratory distress syndrome(RDS), was examined in the present study. METHODS: The records of 50 neonates, randomly chosen from 174 neonates treated with pulmonary surfactant(PS) in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit of Kyunghee University Hospital from 1996 to 2000 were analyzed retrospectively. Chest radiographs taken at the time after birth were classified into four groups according to Bomsel's classification. The a/APO2 and VI values were calculated and compared with the corresponding chest radiographs. RESULTS: Among the 50 cases of RDS examined, three cases were classified into grade I(6%), eight cases into grade II(16%), 20 cases into grade III(40%), and 19 cases into grade IV(38%). The mean a/APO2 of the cases classified into grades I or II was 0.32 and the mean a/APO2 of those classified into grades III and IV was 0.18 and 0.09, respectively. The mean VI was 0.049 for the cases classified into grades I or II and 0.076 and 0.161 for those classified into grades III and IV, respectively. CONCLUSION: The severity of RDS according to chest X-ray findings correlate to the values of respiratory indices, a/APO2 and VI.