• Joice Silva Machado, Trícia Silva Ferreira, Raquel Cristina Gomes Lima, Verônica Cheles Vieira, and Danielle Souto de Medeiros.
• Instituto Multidisciplinar em Saúde, Universidade Federal da Bahia - Vitória da Conquista (BA), Brasil.
• Rev Assoc Med Bras (1992). 2021 Jan 1; 67 (1): 150-155.

ObjectiveTo review the main physiological and pharmacological changes related to prematurity, to promote the evidence-based clinical practice.MethodsThis is a narrative review whose research was carried out in the ScienceDirect and Medline databases via PubMed, searching for articles in any language from January 2000 to February 2020.ResultsPremature newborns are born before completing the maturation process that prepares them for extrauterine life, which occurs especially in the last weeks of pregnancy. Therefore, they have their own characteristics in development. Several physiological peculiarities stand out, such as disturbances in glucose regulation, adrenal function, thermoregulation, immunity, in addition to changes in liver, renal and respiratory functions. Pharmacological aspects were also highlighted, involving pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics.ConclusionsDespite the recent advances in prematurity, it is still an area with many uncertainties, since several changes occur quickly and there are ethical issues that make studies difficult. Thus, it is clear that the therapeutic management of premature infants is still very much based on clinical practice.

10 keywords...

hide…