TY - JOUR T1 - Highlights from this issue JF - Archives of Disease in Childhood - Fetal and Neonatal Edition JO - Arch Dis Child Fetal Neonatal Ed SP - F253 LP - F253 DO - 10.1136/archdischild-2014-306850 VL - 99 IS - 4 AU - Ben Stenson Y1 - 2014/07/01 UR - http://fn.bmj.com/content/99/4/F253.abstract N2 - There is so much fascinating content in this month's issue that it is difficult to know where to begin. I enjoyed reading it all. I particularly liked this article by Ola Hjalmarson and colleagues and the accompanying editorial by Eduardo Bancalari. The two articles convey an important message that is easily overlooked when we benchmark ourselves on outcomes. Bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD) needs a definition for such purposes but it is more properly thought of as a continuum of abnormal lung growth and development that affects all preterm infants to some degree and not just those who meet the criteria to satisfy a binary definition. A group of preterm infants born before 28 weeks gestation had lung function measurements at term and were compared with healthy full term controls. Preterm infants with or without a diagnosis of BPD were markedly different from the term controls in functional residual capacity, mechanical properties and gas mixing efficiency. The infants with a diagnosis BPD were worst of all but the preterm infants without this diagnosis were much more like the preterms with BPD than like the term infants. Other groups have had similar findings … ER -