After birth & Measuring Health

Apgar Scale:

a widely used method to assess the health of newborns at one and five minutes after birth.

Oxytocin causes

the breasts to “let down” milk, heightens the mother’s responsiveness to baby

With the apgar scale, the baby is assessed at

1 minute and again at 5 minutes after birth

A newborn is rated

0, 1, or 2 on each measure, for a maximum score of 10.

A score of 7 to 10 indicates

the baby is in good to excellent condition.

A score of 5 to 7 may mean

the baby needs help to establish breathing, and the test should be repeated every 5 minutes up to 20 minutes.

A score below 5 is

rare and may reflect a variety of problems.

Babies are physiologically well prepared to

handle the stress of being born.

The skull of a baby is

malleable to fit in birth canal

Vernix caseosa (a skin grease)

protects the baby against heat loss before and during birth.

The mother’s production of stress hormones during labor triggers

the production of stress hormones in the baby

Stress hormones in the baby help by

preparing the lungs to begin breathing, sending additional blood to the baby’s brain and vital organs, and making the baby alert right after the birth

Fathers also show hormonal changes that are associated with

positive emotional reactions to infants.

Today, hospitals offer rooming in, in which

the infant stays in the mother’s hospital room all or most of the time.

Right after birth the newborn is

weighed, cleaned up, and tested for signs of any developmental problems.

The newborn rapidly goes from

a warm, quiet, and dark prenatal environment into a bright, noisy, and cold postnatal environment.

The apgar scale evaluates

infants’ heart rate, respiratory effort, muscle tone, body color, and reflex irritability.

Reflex irritability

• 0 = no response

• 1 = grimace

• 2 = coughing, sneezing, and crying

Body color

• 0 = blue and pale

• 1 = body pink but extremities blue

• 2 = entire body pink

Muscle tone

• 0 = limp and flaccid

• 1 = weak, inactive, but some flexion of extremities

• 2 = strong, active motion

Respiratory effort

• 0 = not breathing for more than 1 minute

• 1 = irregular and slow

• 2 = good breathing with normal crying

Heart rate

• 0 = absent

• 1 = slow; less than 100 beats per minute

• 2 = fast; 100-140 beats per minute