Study on Dry Heat Loss of a Very Low Birth Weight (VLBW) Newborn Nursed in an Infant Incubator with Overhead Screen

Ruri Agung Wahyuono¹⁾ Ridho Hantoro²⁾ Gunawan Nugroho³⁾

Department of Engineering Physics, Institut Teknologi Sepuluh Nopember

Jl. Arief Rahman Hakim 60111, Surabaya, Indonesia

email: r_agung_w@ep.its.ac.id¹⁾, hantoro@ep.its.ac.id²⁾, gunawan@ep.its.ac.id³⁾

Abstract   -   The thermal comfort is important aspect for keeping very low birth weight (VLBW) newborn warm. Incubator should provide neutral temperature environment to achieve the thermal comfort so that the newborn won’t suffer hypothermia due to higher heat losses. Additional overhead screen might help toward a better thermal comfort for nursing newborn in incubator. This numerical study aims to analyze the effect of overhead screen to the dry heat loss of a newborn nursed in an incubator. The dry heat loss is constrained to radiant and convective heat losses. The conductive heat loss isn’t analyzed as the study is performed in steady state. The numerical study is conducted by using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) based on physical measurement on AMECARE incubator in Medical Equipment and Calibration Center Surabaya. The numerical calculation is shown for three variation of air setting temperature. The result shows that the presence of overhead screen can reduce the radiant and convective heat losses. The magnitude of dry heat losses reduce down to 6.05, 5.55, and 9.16 Watt respectively for three air setting temperature 32, 33, and 35^oC. The numerical result obtained in this study is well verified to the result of experimental study of 129 VLBW newborn from the literature.

Keywords: VLBW newborn, dry heat loss, CFD, incubator, overhead screen.   .

Highlight:

Fig 1: Temperature distribution (^oC) on an infant incubator (a) without overhead screen and (b) with overhead screen for 32^oC environment temperature

Fig 2: Radiant heat flux (W/m²) on an infant incubator (a) without overhead screen and (b) with overhead screen for 32^oC environment temperature.

 Fig 3: Convective heat transfer coefficient (W/m²K) on an infant incubator (a) without overhead screen and (b) with overhead screen for 32^oC environment temperature.

Reference:

[1]  E. B. Elabbassi. K. Belghazi. S. Delanaud. J. P. Libert. “Dry heat loss in incubator: comparison of two premature newborn sized manikins.” European Journal Applied Physiology. vol. 92. 2004. pp. 679 – 682.

[2]  E. N. Hey and G. Katz. “The Optimum Thermal Environment for naked Babies.” Archieves of Disease in Childhood. vol. 45. 1970. pp. 328 – 334.

[3]  McCall E.M.. Alderdice F. A.. Halliday H. L.. Jenkins J. G.. Vohra S.. “Interventions to prevent hypothermia at birth in preterm and/or low birth weight babies.” Evidence-Based Child Health. vol. 1. 2006. pp. 287 – 324.

[4]  P. J. Sauer. H. J. Dane. H. K. Viser. “New standards for neutral termal environment of healthy very low birth weight infants in week one of life.” Archives of Disease in Childhood. vol. 59. 1984. pp.18 – 22.

[5]  M. K. Ginalski. A. J. Nowak. L. C. Wrobel. “A combined study of heat and mass transfer in an infant incubator with an overhead screen.”  Medical Engineering & Physics. vol. 29. 2007. pp. 531 – 541.

[6] L. C. Wrobel. M. K. Ginalski. A. J. Nowak. D. B. Ingham. A. M. Fic. “An overview of recent applications of computational modeling in neonatology.” Phil. Transaction of The Royal Society A. no. 328. 2010. pp. 2817 – 2834.

[7] I Nyoman Yudiyana. “Analysis of Temperature Distribution on the Mattress in a Baby Incubator.” Undergraduate Thesis Department of Enginering Physics. Institut Teknologi Sepuluh Nopember. 2008.

[8]  Tri Dedi Setiawan. “Design of Humidity Control System and Temperature Monitoring in a Baby Incubator Based on PC.” Undergraduate Thesis Department of Enginering Physics. Institut Teknologi Sepuluh Nopember. 2008.

[9] S. Dollberg and Steven B. Hoath. “Temperature Regulation in Preterm Infants: Role of The Skin-Environment Interface.” NeoReviews. vol. 2.  2001. pp. 282 – 291.

[10]  J. Blazek. Computational Fluid Dynamics: Principle and Applications. ELSEVIER SCIENCE ltd. 2001.

[11]  Fluent manual. Modeling Heat Transfer. Fluent Inc.. September 29. 2006.