Prediction of Rebound Hyperbilirubinemia

Investigators from Seattle Children’s Hospital and the University of California, San Francisco, conducted a retrospective analysis to develop a 2-variable clinical prediction rule to quantify the risk of rebound hyperbilirubinemia in newborns who undergo phototherapy. The prediction rule included a newborn’s gestational age and the difference between the AAP-recommended threshold total serum bilirubin (TSB) level at the time that phototherapy was initiated and the TSB level at the time that phototherapy was discontinued (TSB difference).¹ To develop the prediction rule, the authors abstracted medical record data in newborns born at ≥35 weeks’ gestation at Kaiser Permanente Northern California hospitals between 2012 and 2014 who underwent inpatient phototherapy.

The study sample was randomly divided into a derivation sample to develop the prediction rule and a validation sample to assess its clinical …