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Apgar

Oxygen
an urgent ongoing need

Transition
fetal to postnatal circulation

Tradition

Protocols

Outcomes

Concerns

Question Authority

References

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Notes


Contact: Eileen Nicole Simon
eileen4brainresearch@yahoo.com
Birth: one of life's most hazardous experiences
Human childbirth has long been
recognized as difficult, and potentially
hazardous for both mother and child.
Pain, hemorrhage, and postpartum
fever have received much attention
throughout recorded history.
Anesthesia was first used in surgery
in 1846, and not long after for women
in childbirth.
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Virginia Apgar introduced her system
for scoring the condition of the
newborn in 1953, noting that when
mothers receive an excessive amount
of depressant drugs during labor, it is
common for an infant to breathe once,
but then become apneic for many
minutes.  “A satisfactory cry is
sometimes not established even when
the infant leaves the delivery room ”
>>>
see next page
But should any newborn leave the
delivery room, or his connection to his
mother before breathing is
established?
Tlazolteotl, Aztec Goddess of Fertility
figurine in the Dumbarton Oaks Museum,
Washington D.C.
Posted: February 27, 2006
(a work in progress)
more  >>>
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