INTRODUCTION There are some data indicating a negative impact of postnatal cytomegalovirus (CMV) infection on long-term neurodevelopmental outcome of preterm infants. So far, there is only little knowledge about a cerebral imaging correlate of these neurodevelopmental alterations induced by postnatal CMV infection in preterm infants. The aim of the current study was to investigate the effect of postnatal CMV infection on the incidence of brain injury and on microstructural brain maturation in very preterm infants at term-equivalent age. METHODS Infants <32 gestational weeks (02/2011-11/2018) received cerebral MRI including axial diffusion-weighted images at term-equivalent age. All infants were screened for CMV infection using urine/saliva samples, and infection was regarded as acquired postnatal if a sample became positive >5 postnatal days. We compared brain injury as well as fractional anisotropy and apparent diffusion coefficient in 14 defined cerebral regions between infants with and without postnatal CMV infection. RESULTS 401 infants were eligible, of whom 18 (4.5%) infants had a postnatal CMV infection. There were no significant differences in rates of brain injury or in microstructural brain development between both groups. This applied equally to the subgroup of infants <28 gestational weeks. CONCLUSION Although infants with postnatal CMV infection were born more immature and more frequently suffered from complications related to immaturity, we neither observed a higher rate of preterm brain injury nor disadvantageous alterations in microstructural brain maturation at term-equivalent age.

中文翻译：

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产后巨细胞病毒感染对足月当量年龄极早产儿（微）结构性大脑发育的影响。

引言 有一些数据表明出生后巨细胞病毒（CMV）感染对早产儿的长期神经发育结局有负面影响。到目前为止，对于早产儿出生后 CMV 感染引起的这些神经发育改变的脑成像相关性知之甚少。本研究的目的是调查出生后巨细胞病毒感染对足月相当年龄的极早产儿脑损伤发生率和脑微结构成熟的影响。方法 妊娠周<32周的婴儿（02/2011-11/2018）接受脑部MRI检查，包括足月当量年龄的轴向弥散加权图像。使用尿液/唾液样本对所有婴儿进行 CMV 感染筛查，如果样本在出生后 5 天呈阳性，则视为出生后感染。我们比较了有和没有出生后 CMV 感染的婴儿的脑损伤以及 14 个定义的大脑区域的各向异性分数和表观扩散系数。结果 401 名婴儿符合条件，其中 18 名（4.5%）婴儿有出生后巨细胞病毒感染。两组之间的脑损伤率或脑微结构发育没有显着差异。这同样适用于妊娠周<28 周的婴儿亚组。结论 尽管出生后感染 CMV 的婴儿出生时更加不成熟，并且更容易出现与不成熟相关的并发症，但我们既没有观察到早产脑损伤的发生率较高，也没有观察到足月当量年龄时脑微结构成熟度的不利变化。