"A simple safe relatively inexpensive hormone treatment might help some highrisk pregnant women carry their babies longer a new study http suggests while improving the outlook for their infants. Such a treatment has been long sought. Even better the newest one would appear unlikely to cost  a dose  unless drug makers are slow learners. Federal researchers working with colleagues at  medical centers found that administering vaginal progesterone to women with a short cervix  a risk factor for premature delivery  cuts the rate of delivering before  weeks by . The reduction applies only to women with a short cervix between  centimeter and  centimeters not for women at high risk for other reasons. But for these women few medications have been found effective at keeping a baby in the womb longer.  Physicians led by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development in Bethesda Md. assigned  women with a short cervix to receive daily applications of either a progesterone gel or a placebo gel between the th and rd weeks of pregnancy.     Fewer women who got the progesterone treatment delivered early. versus . in the placebo group the team reported online httponlinelibrary.wiley.comdoi.uog.pdf in the journal Ultrasound in Obstetrics and Gynecology.  Further there were indications the hormone might help the babies too. Fewer babies born to mothers given progesterone had respiratory distress syndrome a lung disorder common to premature infants  versus .. The data set isnt very large  of  women given progesterone delivered early compared with  of  women given a placebo. And of course the trial was funded by the maker of the progesterone gel to be marketed as Prochieve. But giving progesterone gel to  women with short cervical length would appear to prevent one premature birth and a progesterone gel the company already sells Crinone is FDA approved for women in some fertility treatments. The researchers used about  worth of the  strength of Crinone in each dose.  Thus the findings are promising especially when few drugs can keep a pregnant woman from delivering early. One new drug httparticles.latimes.comfebhealthlahefdamakena also progesteronebased is marketed for women who have already had a spontaneous preterm birth. That drug Makena http was the subject of considerable controversy recently after its manufacturer boosted the price from  per dose to  per dose before finally lowering it to . Makena an injectable is administered weekly.  RELATED Drug maker lowers price of Makena pregnancy drug to  per dose  http If the progesterone gel is as effective as the study suggests women would likely find the price tolerable. But probably not at  a dose."