Lung protective strategies for premature infants

Despite many advances in perinatal medicine, bronchopulmonary dysplasia still frequently occurs in very premature infants. The very fragile lungs of these infants therefore have to be protected from birth. The protective strategies consist in applying positive expiratory pressure immediately, and using exogenous surfactant in a prophylactic or early use approach. The recent, variable flow, continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) systems are very efficient and may allow to avoid tracheal intubation, or to facilitate weaning. When mechanical ventilation has to be used, high peak pressure and/or high tidal volume have to be avoided in order to prevent volutrauma. Accepting not to normalize PCO(2) contributes to it. High frequency oscillatory ventilation, which actually does not prevent bronchopulmonary dysplasia, is an extremely efficient ventilatory support technique for severe respiratory failure. Postnatal gluco-corticoid use reduces the rate of bronchopulmonary dysplasia at 36 weeks, but also results in an increased incidence of long-term neurological handicaps. In our experience, using these treatments can be avoided. Maternal transfer to a level three perinatal center, associated with the adequate use of theses lung protective strategies following very premature birth enable the less unfavorable results to be obtained.