A child of 8/8 on the Apgar scale - what does this mean?
Many young parents faced in theirlife with the expression "Apgar scale". Immediately after birth, the doctor must inform the woman of the scores he awarded to the infant according to this scale. Just like height and weight, they are added to the exchange card. These parameters are most needed for doctors, not for the woman herself.
What is the Apgar scale for?
This system was developed by the American anaesthesiologistVirginia Apgar in 1952. The purpose of the scale is to enable midwives to assess the state of health of a newborn baby immediately after his arrival in this world. Thus, you can quickly determine the need for resuscitation.
Evaluate a newborn on the Apgar scale two times- during the first and fifth minutes of life. In rare cases, more such estimates are required. Initially, the reflexes of newborns were checked by nurses. But in our time it is the responsibility of the neonatologist.
Ten-point scale of assessing the state of the newborn
To evaluate a child,ten-point system. This takes into account the indices of his pulse, respiration, muscle tone, skin and congenital reflexes. Each of them is evaluated separately, awarding from 0 to 2 points. Their sum is the result of the survey.
A newborn baby is weighed, measuredthe value of its growth, the circumference of the head and chest. If your baby was rated more than 7-8 points on the Apgar scale, the child is absolutely healthy. In this case, it is with the mother before discharge. If the overall score is less than 7, the child needs intensive care.
Good enough is the 8/8 score on the Apgar scale, as in the first minute 10 points receive less than 15% of the newborns.
Are the concepts "viable" and "healthy" similar?
Do not panic or get upset if the doctorgave the child an estimate of 7/8 on the Apgar scale. If the baby was immediately put to his mother on his stomach, he was given a breast and after that he was taken for examination, he is viable. But here about the state of his health can be judged only on the basis of the results of certain tests and a survey. Sufficiently high is the score of 8/9 and even 8/8 on the Apgar scale.
The child's health is checked, regardless of the wishes of his mother. Parents may require consent to be vaccinated, but no one will ask for permission to conduct a survey.
During this examination, the doctor must take blood from thethumb on the stem in order to exclude the presence of five common mutations. If they are detected in a timely manner, with proper therapy, the probability of their cure significantly increases. The kid in this case will be full and healthy.
Scheme for determining the total score
Analyze the baby's state according to the Apgar scale onthe first five minutes of his life. Immediately after the birth, they look when and how the infant screamed, examine the condition of his skin, evaluate it for the bright light of the flashlight, determine the tone of the muscles and palpitation.
If the child has a natural color of the skinand he loudly screamed without help immediately after his birth, the kid gets the highest score on the Apgar scale. In addition, he must resist when performing a flexion or extension by the neonatologist of his limbs. In bright light, such a newborn frowns, and the beat frequency of his heart according to prescribed standards is about 100 beats per minute.
Neonatologist also checks the presence or absenceunconditioned reflexes. If the child is put on the back and put an emphasis on his legs, he must repulse. This is called a crawl reflex. When the child takes his armpits and puts his feet on the table, while tilting slightly forward, he must rearrange the legs, imitating walking. This is a reflex of an automatic gait.
A low score on the Apgar scale
But not every kid can showexcellent results after passing through the birth canal and experienced as a result of this great stress. Therefore, if the crumb was rated slightly lower than 8/8 on the Apgar scale, do not get upset, as this is the norm. In addition, do not forget about the temperament of the newborn little man. After all, moms are also very calm. So why should the child be active?
As already mentioned, the indicatorsthe life of the child during the first and fifth minutes of his life. Quite common is the case when the first score is 1 point lower than the second. For example, an 8/8 Apgar score indicates that the indicators did not change significantly after 5 minutes.
But often enough in the exchange card you cansee slightly different meanings. For example, 7/8 and 6/8 points on the Apgar scale indicate that after five minutes, the baby got accustomed to a world completely unfamiliar to him. Therefore, the indicators have become much higher. In most cases, during this short period of time, the body saturates with oxygen, which affects the improvement of the cardiovascular system. This contributes to the addition of one or two points.
Table of evaluation of the criteria for the life of a newborn
For a better understanding of what assessments and what the doctors are putting the newborn child to, you can use the table below.
| 2 points | 1 point | 0 points | |
| Condition of muscle tone | The baby is mobile | There is insufficient activity of the baby | Absence of any movements |
| Features of breathing | The child self-loud shouted right after birth | Weak, irregular scream | No screaming and breathing |
| Heart rate | > 100 | <100 | Absent |
| Skin color | Light pink | The skin of the arms and legs is blue, the rest of the body has a natural color | All the skin of the baby has a blue tint |
| Unconditioned reflexes | There is an excellent response to the main stimuli | Reaction to stimuli is poorly expressed, mobility is practically absent | There is absolutely no reaction to external stimuli |
But with the help of this table you can only judgephysical health of the baby. It is not possible to apply Apgar scales for other forecasts. For example, it is not used to determine the child's mental abilities.
How to get a high score?
Of course, every mom wants her baby to be healthy. 8 points on the Apgar scale is one of the most desired indicators for it. But this result depends primarily on her.
Behavior during childbirth
Do not be too frivolous to treatdoctors say during childbirth. After all, from the favorable outcome of this process depends on how the child will be born. 8/9 points on the Apgar scale will be received by that kid, whose mother behaved correctly and followed all the doctor's recommendations. In the opposite case, a baby may have a bruise instead of a head. There is nothing terrible and deadly about this, of course. During the first month, the blue color of the skin changes to natural pink. But the Apgar scores will drop by 1 or 2 points.
Do not worry if some indicator wasslightly below the norm. This does not indicate disability or the presence of pathological health problems. The Apgar score is an important indicator that does not affect the future of the child in any way. It is considered only at birth, both height and weight.
</ p>
