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Prenatal steroids at 34–36 weeks gestation
Editors choice this month and free to download is this leading article by Gordon Smith, David Rowitch and Ben Mol. The history of neonatology is littered with examples of widely popular treatment approaches that proved to be harmful when better evidence became available. This article cautions against the use of prenatal steroids at 34–36 weeks gestation, arguing that the benefits are short term outcome measures and the plausible risk of long term consequences has not yet been evaluated adequately. With a number needed to treat of 35 mothers to prevent one newborn infant from requiring respiratory support 3 days after birth, a great many mothers and infants would be exposed to treatment in pursuit of this short term outcome advantage. It is argued that there is insufficient evidence of long term safety to justify this. 312333
Post-term pregnancy is an independent risk factor for neonatal morbidity
Nehama Linder and colleagues analysed the outcomes of around 23 thousand live born infants from low risk pregnancies delivered at a single centre in Israel over a 5 year period. Neonatal morbidities were assessed in three groups according to their …