Neonatal Assessment Flashcards

1
Q

What are the goals of a newborn baby assessment?

A
  • Identify physical abnormalities
  • Parental re-assurance
  • Health education
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2
Q

What are the components of a newborn baby assessment?

A
  • Hx (antenatal, labor, medications of mother)
  • Obs
  • Measurements for growth tracking (%iles)
  • Physical exam
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3
Q

Why do we check for the red reflex in babies?

A
  • Red reflex is caused by reflection of light off the blood-vessel rich retina of the eye
  • If this reflex is absent, this means something’s blocking it (e.g. cataracts), or the vessels in the retina itself are abnormal (e.g. retinoblastoma)
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4
Q

What physical exam signs do we check for in a newborn baby assessment? (Of course, we assess other stuff too, but these are the non-inspection stuff)

A
  • Special senses (vision/hearing (why?), red reflex (why?))
  • Hips (check for dysplasia)
  • Peripheral O2 sat
  • Primitive reflexes
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5
Q

What do we check for during general inspeciton on baby exam?

A
  • Colour (jaundice/cyanosis)
  • Is it making any spontaneous movements on its own?
  • Behaviour (are they unsettled?)
  • Plot growth (weight, head circ, height)
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6
Q

What do we check for when assessing baby head shape? What are abnormal signs?

A
  • Check for normal sings (caput, molding)
  • Abnormal signs include microcephaly, macrocephaly (?hydrocephalus), cephalohematoma, plagiocephaly, scaphoceaphly (boat-head)
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7
Q

What is abnormal when assessing a baby’s fontanelles?

A
  • Bulging/sunken
  • Very small/large
  • Immobile sutures
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8
Q

Outline the exam of the newborn baby’s face

A
  • Any dysmorphism?
  • Eyes (position + red reflex)
  • Ears (tags/pits)
  • Mouth (symmetry when crying (?__ nerve palsy), cleft palate (can be sign of genetic predisp to hearing loss)
  • Vision (fixing and following light)
  • Hearing (reacts to sounds)
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9
Q

What do we check for on a baby’s neck?

A
  • Masses
  • Webbed neck (?turners)
  • Range of motion
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10
Q

Baby exam thorax

A
  • Breath sounds normal?
  • Chest wall expansion?
  • Any heart murmurs?
  • Shape/symmetry
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11
Q

Baby exam abdo

A
  • Shape (distension, masses)
  • Tenderness
  • Soft/tense
  • Overlying skin changes
  • Defect in abdo wall (such as omphalocele)
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12
Q

Baby exam limbs

A
  • Equal length?
  • ROM?
  • Number of fingers and toes
  • Creases (?genetic conditions)
  • Complete nails/bones
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13
Q

Baby pelvis/genitalia exam

A
  • Creases symmetrical?
  • Inguinal masses?
  • Femoral pulses palpable?
  • In boys, check for hypo/edpispadias (WIT?)
  • Descended testes
  • Position/patency of anus (?meconium)
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14
Q

Baby back/spine exam

A
  • Check for scoliosis
  • Check for dimple/hair growth (?spina bifida)
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15
Q

Hip dysplasia risk factors

A
  • First born
  • Female
  • FHx
  • Breech
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16
Q

Why is it important to screen for certain conditions in newborn babies (bloodspot test)?

A

Early detection can help reduce the chances of developing long term physical/neurodevelopmental disability.

17
Q

What are the requirements before a heel prick test can be taken? What happens during the test?

A
  • Performed at 48-72hrs age
  • Baby must have established feeds (if pre-term, multiple are done)
  • During test, heel is pricked, and blood is spotted onto 4 areas of the test card
18
Q

What conditions are screened for on the heel prick?

A
  • Metabolic disorders (amino acid disorders, fatty acid oxidation disorders, organic acid disorders)
  • Endocrine disorders (CAH [21-dehydroxylase deficiency [WIT?], primary congenital hypothyroidism)
  • Severe combined immunodeficiency (SCID)
  • Other (CF, Spinal Muscular Atrophy)
19
Q

Is the heel-prick the only screening that occurs during early life?

A
  • No
  • Also peripheral O2 sats, and hearing tests, and newborn baby examination
20
Q

What treatments do we give to babies right at the time of birth? Why?

A
  • Delayed cord clamping (why?)
  • Vitamin K (why?)
  • Thermo-neutral environment (reduce hypothermia risk)
  • Blue light therapy
  • Nutritional supplementation (pre-term formula/fortification of breast milk)
  • Probiotics (to reduce risk of necrotizing enterocolitis)
  • Caffeine (reduce apnea/increase resp rate; increased diaphragm contractility + increased resp drive)
  • Exogenous surfactant
21
Q

What is haemorrhagic disease of the newborn/vitamin k deficiency bleeding? Why does it occur? How to prevent?

A
  • Vitamin K poorly crosses the placenta; babies may not be able to make enough clotting factors
  • The first week of life, this can lead to internal bleeding such as gastrointestinal bleeding. Later (up to 6 months), this can lead to serious intracranial haemorrhage
  • We prevent this with vitamin K injections
22
Q

Why do we put jaundiced babies in sunglasses under blue lights?

A
  • Blue light of specific wavelengths converts bilirubin into its water soluble form, enabling excretion
  • This bypasses the need for bilirubin conjugation