Meconium Aspiration Syndrome

Presented by

Fred Hill, MA, RRT

Introduction

• Meconium is contents of fetal bowel. Usually not released until after birth.• Usually sterile without odor• Thick, tar-like dark green to black material

• Primarily a disease of term and postterm newborns with episodes of asphyxia before or during labor

• Meconium passage before birth in ~ 10-20% of births• Aspiration occurs in ~ 50% of meconium stained

newborns

Prevention

• Intubation immediately following delivery with suction applied to ET tube in depressed meconium stained infant

• Administration of 100% oxygen

Chest X-Ray

Irregular patchy infiltrates, often with hyperinflation

Treatment

• Hypoxemia treated with warmed, humidified oxygen

• Mechanical ventilation with PEEP• Broad-spectrum antibiotics

Complications

• Pneumonia• Pnemothorax: due to ball-valve

phenomenon• Persistent pulmonary hypertension• Tachypnea that persists even after the

need for oxygen has passed