Prenatal exposure of very low birth weight infants to chronic indolent chorioamnionitis with
organisms such as mycoplasma and ureaplasma is frequent. Chorioamnionitis is
inconsistently associated with changed risks of respiratory distress syndrome (RDS) or
bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD), probably because the diagnosis of chorioamnionitis
does not quantify the extent or duration of the fetal exposures to infection and inflammation.
The correlations between prenatal exposures and postnatal lung disease also are …