Cerebral Near-infrared Spectroscopy Monitoring Versus Treatment as Usual for Extremely Preterm Infants: a Protocol for the Follow-up Study for the SafeBoosC-III Trial

In the SafeBoosC-III trial, the objective is to investigate the effect of treatment based on cerebral near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) monitoring of brain oxygenation compared with treatment as usual in extremely preterm infants. The primary outcome of the trial is death or survival with severe brain injury at 36 weeks' postmenstrual age. Despite an association between severe brain injury diagnosed in the neonatal period and later neurodevelopmental disability, this relationship is not always strong. Therefore, if treatment based on cerebral NIRS monitoring decreases the risks of death or survival with severe brain injury, it is important to document if the beneficial effect persists into early childhood, in the form of better neurodevelopmental outcome. Furthermore, it is also important to identify evidence of unexpected harms. It would be unfortunate if cerebral NIRS monitoring became standard practice without good evidence that long-term patient-relevant benefits outweigh possible harms. As the SafeBoosC-III trial intends to randomise 1600 infants, there is potential to achieve sufficient power for a meaningful assessment of the experimental intervention's effect on long-term neurodevelopment, as well as an evaluation of unexpected harms. The objective of the SafeBoosC III follow-up study is to investigate the benefits and harms of treatment guided by cerebral NIRS monitoring of brain oxygenation in extremely preterm infants during the first 72 hours of life, assessed at two years' corrected age. The hypothesis is that the intervention will decrease a composite of death or moderate-or-severe neurodevelopmental disability at two years' corrected age, and/or increase cognitive function in survivors assessed by the Bayley III/IV test, with insignificant harms. The investigators aim to collect data on as many children as possible and will do this by collecting clinical data from health care records as well as answers from parental questionnaires.