PEDIATRICS Vol. 63 No. 1 January 1979, pp. 163-165
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Corticosteroids and Respiratory Distress Syndrome: Status 1979

Philip L. Ballard M.D., Ph.D.1 and Roberta A. Ballard M.D.2

1 Department of Pediatrics and Cardiovascular Research Institute, University of California, San Francisco, CA 94119
2 Department of Pediatrics, Mount Zion Hospital and Medical Center, San Francisco, CA 94119

The pioneering report of Liggins and Howie1 on the use of antepartum glucocorticoid treatment to prevent respiratory distress syndrome (RDS) appeared in this journal just over six years ago. Their article stimulated a number of subsequent investigations regarding the efficacy, safety, and mechanism of this prophylactic treatment. Publication of the articles by Papageorgiou et al2 and by Taeusch et al3 in this issue of Pediatrics, along with the recent report of Block et al,4 now provides three additional prospective, controlled trials with synthetic glucocorticoid, all of which confirm the observations of Liggins and Howie.1.5 In addition, a number of retrospective, nonblind studies also support the usefulness of prenatal steroid therapy.6-10