Air versus supplemental oxygen for resuscitation of term or late preterm infants at birth

Approximately 1% to 5% of newly born infants require some form of respiratory support, including supplemental oxygen for the respiratory transition immediately after birth. Despite a long-standing debate, the optimal concentration of oxygen at initiation of resuscitation of late preterm and term infants immediately after birth is still unknown.

Primary objective To assess the benefits and harms of air compared with supplemental oxygen for resuscitation of term or late preterm infants at birth in reducing rates of mortality and long-term neurodevelopmental impairment (NDI). Secondary objectives To assess whether the benefits and harms of air compared with supplemental oxygen differ according to different oxygen concentrations, gestational age (GA), whether oxygen was titrated to saturation targets and the income of the study country.

We searched CENTRAL, MEDLINE, Embase, CINAHL, two trials registries, Epistemonikos and the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) up to 12 January 2026. We checked reference lists of included studies and other publications related to the topic of this review, and conducted forward/backward citation searching.