The Effect of Antenatal Betamethasone on Prevention of Neonatal Respiratory Distress Syndrome before Elective Cesarean Section at Term

Background: Respiratory distress syndrome (RDS) is an important respiratory disease possibly caused by surfactant deficiency in infants and has a heavy financial burden on the country's health system. The purpose of the present study was to evaluate the relationship between RDS in neonates who were born by elective cesarean at term with and without corticosteroids. Materials and Methods: This randomized clinical trial study was performed on all mothers who delivered by elective cesarean section at Alzahra and Taleghani Hospital with a Pregnancy age of more than 37 weeks. After considering exclusion criteria, the patients were randomly divided into either betamethasone (IM injection of 12 mg daily for two doses) or the control group. The comparison of these two groups was in RDS, hospitalization in the neonatal ward, or admission to newborn intensive care unit (NICU). Results: One hundred and sixty patients participated in the study. Fifty percentage (n = 80) of them received betamethasone and 50% did not. Of all, 160 neonates, 73.8% in Group 1 and 82.5 of the Group 2 had a 1st-min Apgar score of 9.9-9.10. Significant differences were observed in neonatal Apgar score in two groups (P < 0.05). RDS was found in 11 (6.87%) neonates born from both groups. The hospitalization of neonatal in intensive care units and the time of hospitalization of infants in the betamethasone group were less than the control group and statistically significant (P < 0.05). No cases of necrotizing enterocolitis and neonatal sepsis were observed. Conclusion: The results of the present study represented that giving betamethasone to mothers with programmed elective cesarean at term beseem to have a beneficial effect on RDS, NICU admission, and hospitalization. More studies with a larger sample size including the effects of other steroids are recommended.