Twenty full-term newborns given phenobarbital 8 mg/kg/day for the first four days of life had
significantly lower concentrations of serum indirect bilirubin than a group of 20 control
infants by the fourth and fifth day of life. Similarly, ten infants with elevated serum indirect
bilirubin levels treated from the fifth to ninth day showed significantly lower values by day 10
than controls. In vivo glucuronidation studies using salicylamide as the substrate showed a
more pronounced average increase in the glucuronide fraction between the fifth and tenth …