Ola Didrik Saugstad (born 5 March 1947) is a Norwegian pediatrician, neonatologist and neuroscientist noted for his research on resuscitation of newborn children and his contribution to reduce child mortality.
[1][3] Christian P. Speer and Henry L. Halliday described Saugstad as a "world renowned expert in neonatal medicine," particularly on hypoxia and purine metabolism, hypoxia-reoxygenation injury, the effect and mechanisms of oxygen radicals in the neonatal period, mechanisms of lung injury and newborn resuscitation.
"[2] Saugstad received the 2012 Nordic Medical Prize, is a member of the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters and became a Knight First Class of the Order of St. Olav in 2010.
In the late 1980s, Saugstad and Rooth published a seminal article questioning the use of 100% oxygen in the resuscitation of newborn children.
[10] This would lead to his major discovery of the dangers of using 100% oxygen, resulting in the amendment of the international guidelines for newborn resuscitation in 2010 based on the research of Saugstad and his team.
[6] His 2019 book Kampen om oksygenet ("The War Over Oxygen") discusses what he describes as "one [of] the greatest scandals in the history of medicine;"[7] former Prime Minister Kjell Magne Bondevik introduced the book when it was released at the House of Literature in Oslo.
[8] Saugstad is known for having taken elements of the research of 2019's Nobel laureates in medicine William Kaelin Jr., Peter J. Ratcliffe and Gregg L. Semenza to the infant's bedside.