A Clinical Trial of High Oxygen Pressure for the Respiratory-Distress Syndrome

Abstract

THE mortality of the respiratory-distress syndrome in the newborn infant (often called hyaline-membrane disease) has remained essentially unchanged. It is estimated that in the United States approximately 30,000 newborn infants die of it each year. At the Boston Lying-in Hospital, where some 6200 babies are delivered each year, hyaline-membrane formation and massive atelectasis were the major findings in 38 per cent of the 84 neonatal deaths per year during the period between 1955–1960.¹ Attempts at therapy have taken two general directions, one attempting to reverse or abort the course of the disease (for example, by raising the serum albumin concentration . . .