A child of 8/8 on the Apgar scale - what does this mean?

Many young parents faced in their lives with the expression "Apgar scale". Immediately after birth, the doctor must tell the woman the points that he awarded to the infant according to this scale. Just like height and weight, they are brought into 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 anesthesiologist Virginia 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 the 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.

A ten-point scale for assessing the state of a newborn

A ten-point system is used to estimate the child. It 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.

The newborn baby is weighed, the value of his height, the circumference of the head and chest is measured. 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 doctor gave 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 to the 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 need to consent to an inoculation, but no one will ask for permission to conduct the survey.

During this examination, the doctor must take blood from the thumb on the stem in order to exclude the presence of five frequently occurring mutations. If they are found in time, 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 condition of the baby on the Apgar scale during the first five minutes of his life. Immediately after birth, they look at 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 skin and he loudly screamed without help immediately after his birth, the baby 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.

Also, the neonatologist checks for the presence or absence of unconditioned 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 a 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 Apgar score

But not every kid can show excellent 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 child's vital signs are assessed 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 can see a 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 assessment of the criteria for the life of a newborn

For a better understanding of what assessments and what the doctors are putting a newborn baby, you can use the table below.

But with the help of this table you can judge only about the physical 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. Immediately after the woman learns about the pregnancy, she should analyze and adjust her diet, the regime of the day. It is also necessary to abide by absolutely all the prescriptions of the doctor. Only in this case a strong and healthy baby will be born in 9 months, which will receive at least 8 points on the Apgar scale.

Behavior during childbirth

Do not be too frivolous to refer to the words of doctors 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 carried out all the doctor's recommendations. In the opposite case, the baby may have a bruise instead of the 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 was slightly below normal. This does not indicate disability or the presence of pathological health problems. Assessment on the Apgar scale is an important indicator that does not affect the future of the child in any way. It is taken into account only at birth, both height and weight.