When a baby is born, health professionals make several assessments to know that everything is fine and that it does not require special attention for a problem during pregnancy or childbirth. One of the tools they use to make a quick diagnosis of possible problems is the Apgar scale or test.
Many parents have heard of him, or those words are common ("Apgar test"), but they are not very clear what it really is, when it is done or how they do it. Next we are going to talk about Apgar test and we will answer all those possible doubts.
What is the Apgar test
He Apgar test It is a first assessment that is made to the baby at birth and that aims to detect possible problems quickly and unpleasantly for the baby. Quick, because if there is a problem, you have to act as soon as possible and not very upset, because if everything is normal, you don't have to make the baby feel bad at a time of assessment.
It is called that, from Apgar, because it was created by Virgina Apgar, an American doctor specializing in pediatrics and anesthesia, who in 1953 developed this method and published it in order to be able to quickly assess the condition of newborns. Thanks to her, thanks to her test, many babies have saved their lives being able to detect prematurely any problem that, if not seen, could be fatal a few minutes or hours after delivery.
When and how is it done?
He Apgar test It is done twice, to see the evolution of the baby: one minute after birth and then five minutes later. It is a scale that looks at the heart rate, breathing, muscle tone, reflexes and color of the baby.
It is no test or grade that serves to predict the health of a baby, or how strong and large it will be (or not), or anything like that. I say this because on some occasion I have heard mothers comparing scores of their children ("mine has taken an 8 in the Apgar test", "because mine has taken a 9"), but responds to the state of the baby in the moment of evaluation, how sleepy or awake you are and to see if you are adapting well to the world you just arrived.
The test is divided into 5 sections or questions that score from 0 to 2. Once completed the points are added, which In most cases it is 8 to 10 points in the first minute of life. In the event that at that moment, the Apgar is from 5 to 7, it is possible that it is due to problems of oxygen supply during delivery and then the professionals will apply a nearby source of oxygen and probably dry it with a towel relatively vigorously in order to motivate the baby to breathe harder. With both interventions the score should be 8 to 10 at 5 minutes.
Some babies, at least, get scores lower than 5 (premature babies or those born by emergency caesarean section are more likely to stay on this score), who respond to problems during childbirth or to respiratory or cardiac problems. In this case, the intervention of professionals should be greater, starting with an oxygen mask and, if it is not enough, introducing a tube to make him breathe from the outside and administering the first drugs to improve his heart rate. If this is not enough the baby is transferred to the intensive care unit to continue with the necessary interventions.
So you can see exactly what they are looking at, I will explain them below:
1. Heart Rate: looks at the phonendoscope.
2. Breathing:
3. Muscle tone:
4. Reflexes: It is the response to some relatively annoying external stimulus (touching the soles of your feet, sucking your nose a little, ...).
5. Skin color:
Once the test has been carried out, as we have already explained, the points are added and based on the score, what to do is decided. Most babies have a maximum score of 9 at the minute of birth, because everyone still has very blue hands and feet. At 5 minutes they are more rosy and then, under normal conditions, they score 10. Even many babies who score below 7, with a little stimulation, have a correct score at 5 minutes. If not, the interventions that we have explained above begin.
