The promotion of adequate ponderal growth is of major importance as it has been associated with a favourable neurodevelopment outcome throughout childhood [24, 25]. It is also agreed that BPD has an unfavourable effect on the cognitive outcome of children born very pre-term that seems to persist into school age even in the absence of severe brain lesions [26].
This clinically interesting study has three limitations. First of all, as it was a prospective non- randomised interventional cohort study, it may have been affected by a higher number of known and unknown confounders than a randomised, controlled trial; secondly, the number of enrolled infants was relatively small; and thirdly, the infants’ body composition was not assessed.