When a premature baby needs help breathing but is not sick enough to need a tube down the windpipe, doctors reach for soft prongs that sit in the baby's nose. A 2025 study compared the two gentlest of these methods head-to-head for the first time and found they worked about equally well, with one…

When a newborn's circulation begins to fail, doctors often add a steroid called hydrocortisone to the blood-pressure medicines already running. A 2025 review that pooled 20 studies asked a question no earlier study was designed to answer: does it matter when that steroid is started? The answer…

When a baby is born extremely early, doctors often give a medicine called surfactant that keeps the tiny air sacs in the lungs from collapsing, and researchers have been looking for the gentlest way to deliver it. A large Italian study tested adding a brief lung-opening step just before the…

A big study across 40 newborn intensive care units in Japan found that when hospital teams were given a structured way to spot and fix their own weakest areas of care, the most premature babies — those born more than three months early — had noticeably fewer life-threatening emergencies in their…

A Norwegian study followed 108 very premature babies to see whether two hours of skin-to-skin contact with their mother right after birth would help their thinking, language, and movement skills as toddlers. By age 2 to 3, children who had the early cuddle scored no differently on development tests…

A study from a hospital in Beijing followed premature babies who were fed breast milk with extra nutrients added in one of two ways: a fixed "one-size" recipe, or a personalized recipe tailored to each baby. In the early months, the personalized group grew better—bigger head size, better weight…

For a very premature baby whose lungs are still developing, breathing support can go on for weeks, and many of these babies go on to develop a chronic lung condition called bronchopulmonary dysplasia, or BPD. A new study asked whether adding a breathed-in (inhaled) steroid medicine, given as a fine…

A large 2026 research review combined the results of 12 earlier studies involving 1,144 newborns and found that stronger, higher-dose phototherapy lowers jaundice faster and shortens treatment time compared with gentler, lower-dose light. The benefit was largest for premature babies and those with…

A new study of 240 premature babies found that holding them skin-to-skin against a parent's chest for several hours a day — a practice called kangaroo mother care — was linked to far better survival, fewer infections, and faster recovery from breathing problems, even while the babies were still…

Kangaroo mother care means holding a small or early-born baby skin-to-skin against a parent's bare chest, usually with breastfeeding support. A 2026 review that combined 31 studies and 8,561 babies found that this simple practice lowers the risk of dying in the hospital, helps babies grow faster…

A hospital in Dallas found that a simple, standardized way of supporting the breathing of babies born about six to ten weeks early cut the number who needed a mechanical breathing machine by roughly four-fold—from about 18 in 100 down to about 4 in 100—without any increase in complications. The key…

Premature and small babies are especially vulnerable to a dangerous bloodstream infection called late-onset sepsis — an infection that appears after a baby's first three days of life. Researchers in Pakistan tested whether a natural protein found in breast milk, given as a daily supplement, could…