1 Division of Newborn Medicine, Department of Pediatrics, The Milton S. Hershey Medical Center, The Pennsylvania State University College of Medicine, Hershey
To the Editor.
De Vries et al1 describe an interesting association between serum bilirubin levels > 14 mg/dL and sensorineural deafness in low birth weight infants. A similar association (in infants who were exposed to lower serum bilirubin levels) was reported by Bergman et al.2 These results are important because of their potential influence on how we treat these infants, yet they raise certain questions.
The authors classified infants as "high risk" or "low risk" based on the presence of certain "adverse factors," but they do not tell us about the distribution of these factors in the study patients.