Effective Care of the Newborn Infant

This book is a companion volume to "Effective Care in Pregnancy and Childbirth" (edited by Iain Chalmers et al, OUP), and evaluates the care of newborn infants. Medical research has produced an explosion of new knowledge concerning the causes, diagnosis, prognosis, treatment and prevention of diseases of the newborn infant. As the pace of therapeutic innovation quickens, there is an increasing need for efficient access to information concerning the probable effects of therapy. It is the goal of this book to meet the urgent demand for a systematic summary of the best available evidence concerning the expected outcomes of therapeutic decisions in neonatology.;Like "Effective Care in Pregnancy and Childbirth", the book consists fundamentally of quantitative reviews of randomized trials of alternative courses of action. It contains some 2000 new analyses of data from the clincial trials literature, representing the vast majority of randomized trials in neonatology. The result is the first systematic review of evidence from randomized clinical trials in this field and an explicit dissection of the research data supporting, or in some cases not supporting, clinical management of the newborn. This book should interest paediatricians, especially neonatologists; obstetricians, especially maternal-foetal medicine specialists; family practitioners; and epidemiologists.