title: When early and often counts.
abstract: In 2000, Millennium Development Goal 4 called for global deaths in under fives, to be reduced by two thirds by 2015 (United Nations Millennium Declaration (UNMD) 2000). Birth asphyxia - failure to initiate or sustain spontaneous breathing at birth - causes up to one million neonatal deaths per year (Ersdal and Singhal 2013). A high proportion.of these are in low-resource countries. In 2009, a group of doctors and academics from hospitals and universities in Norway and the United States wanted to find out if the Helping babies breathe (HBB) simulation-based programme for midwives in low-resource countries helped reduce newborn fatalities in a hospital in Tanzania. I was one of those doctors and our research showed that when teaching switched from a one-day programme to a low-dose, high-frequency model, emphasising immediate basic steps, there was a significant increase in the number of infants stimulated at birth, and a 40 per cent decrease in early neonatal mortality.
authors.forename: Hege
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Ersdal
mesh_terms: D001238:Asphyxia Neonatorum / Q000401:mortality / Q000451:nursing*; D002983:Clinical Competence; D003906:Developing Countries; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007226:Infant Mortality / Q000639:trends; D007318:Inservice Training / Q000458:organization & administration*; D008880:Midwifery / Q000193:education* / Q000379:methods; D009664:Norway; D012151:Resuscitation / Q000193:education* / Q000451:nursing*; D013636:Tanzania; D013663:Teaching / Q000458:organization & administration; D014481:United States