Healthcare

Apgar score is a medical rating procedure to evaluates the condition of newborn infants, especially to physical signs (heart rate, respiratory effort, muscle tone, reflex irritability, and skin color) during first five minutes after birth. This score also used to identify those that require life-sustaining medical assistance, such as resuscitation.

The best newborn Apgar score are a 9 or 10, whereas a score of 7 or above is considered ‘normal’.
The low Apgar score often found in newborn process, which might imply adverse health outcomes in later life. However, the score also could improve during five minute test.
When this Apgar score keep low after five minutes test, this baby considered need medical attention immediately.

Although this score not designed to predict adverse health outcome in later life, however, several suggestions may associated with this score, such as disorder related to nervous system and brain area.
At least, some archives said that it may associated with cerebral palsy, epilepsy, mental retardation, and intelligence quotients.

A new study from Denmark said that, the low of Apgar score may associated with the risk of attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).

According to the study authors, in their previous research, prenatal stress might play a role in causing low Apgar scores and also ADHD development.

Therefore, due to this, the teams assessed data on 980,902 children born in Denmark between 1988 and 2001.
The study itself funded by the Danish Medial Research Council, the Nordic Cancer Union, and the European Research Council.

Reported in Pediatric on January 18, 2011, the authors write that “the Apgar score may be a valueable predictor of subtle neurodevelopmental disabilities such as ADHD.”

As the ADHD can caused by several factors, the authors plans to establish more study that focus on other risk factor for ADHD and assess the relative importance of a low Apgar score in the causal pathway to ADHD.