Work package 2.2

Hypothesis: Antibiotics treatment affects immunity and maturation in newborn preterm pigs.

Antibiotics, neonatal diet, probiotics and later immunity

Preventive antibiotics treatment around birth, with or without probiotics, may prevent neonatal infections, but the effects on immune, gut and brain maturation are not known. Both positive and negative body effects have been demonstrated (10,20-22).

Methods

Preterm pigs are reared at our piglet neonatal intensive care unit (NICU), fed milk formula and given oral and systemic antibiotics for 5 days after birth, with or without subsequent treatment with probiotics for 1 week. Preterm pigs are reared for up to 4 weeks.

Results

Clinical parameters of preterm pigs include growth, infection resistance and NEC outbreak. By the end of the protocol, pigs are generally analyzed as for WP 2.1.