1 Department of Pediatrics, Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, Nashville, Tennessee 37203
Few diseases of a noninfectious origin have undergone such a marked change in prognosis in recent years as clinical hyaline membrane disease (CHMD or IRDS). With the advent of newborn intensive care units and all that they currently imply in the management of acutely ill infants with severe CHMD, little wonder that the prognosis and natural history of this disease have been markedly altered. This altered outlook and the documentation of the physiological alterations in lung function is well illustrated in the article of Bryan et al.2 entitled "Pulmonary Function Studies During the First Year of Life in Infants Recovering from the Respiratory Distress Syndrome" which appears in this issue of Pediatrics.