Differences in Preferences for Neonatal Outcomes Among Health Care Professionals, Parents, and Adolescents

Abstract

With recent improvements in survival of infants of borderline viability, the issue of whether to treat such infants actively continues to be debated.^1-9 Both the Canadian Paediatric Society¹⁰ and the American Academy of Pediatrics¹¹ have issued statements encouraging the involvement of parents in decision making, and in fact, to support the primacy of parental decisions for all infants at the threshold of viability. These statements were developed by health professionals using data on the mortality and morbidity of infants at each gestational age, without explicit consideration of the values and preferences of parents or members of society.