Over the past decades, evidence-based medicine has become an international endeavor. In neonatal intensive care, however, well-designed randomized controlled trials (RCTs) are quite rare, and clinical decision-making – especially in time-sensitive emergency situations (delivery room, NICU) – may be challenging and mainly based on the providers' expertise and experience. Since the approaches to key issues in neonatal intensive care often differ significantly between countries, I found it was now time to bring together the best and most current clinical evidence available, and the broadest experience possible. The challenge of this new handbook Neonatal Emergencies therefore was to find a group of internationally distinguished experts, not only among different institutions but also across countries, continents, and disciplines. I am pleased to have gathered a group of accomplished neonatologists, pediatric cardiologists, anesthesiologists, and critical care physicians from all over the world. We learned a lot from each other while writing the chapters that will follow this Preface.

The book is written for an interdisciplinary readership, i.e., pediatric residents, fellows and junior faculty, NICU nurses and nurse practitioners, obstetricians, midwifes, anesthesiologists, physicians in emergency medicine, and specialized paramedics. It can be used for emergency situations as well as a guide for mock codes or clinical workshops. Our goals were straightforward: this handbook should be comprehensive but practical and easy to use so that the information provided may actually help health care providers with different levels of experience to save newborn lives and prevent disability.