VITAMIN-K DEFICIENCY AND HEMORRHAGE IN INFANCY

Vitamin K given intramuscularly will prevent largely hemorrhagic disea se in the newborn infant. Results with oral vitamin K prophylaxis, cur rently used in some countries following the association found in a sin gle report between childhood cancer and intramuscular vitamin K, are f ar more controversial. Any role of vitamin K in the prevention of Intr aventricular hemorrhage (IVH) in premature infants has not been demons trated sufficiently. Ongoing developments in this field will lead to i mproved methods of detecting early vitamin K deficiency and perhaps su itable alternatives to intramuscular vitamin K prophylaxis in the newb orn.