APGARS What are they ???

OK so your baby has been born and you are looking at the chart you see something like this
APGAR 8-1 9-5 but what does it mean?
The APGAR scoring system was invented by Dr Apgar in 1953 and is still used all over the world.
The score is used to indicate the wellbeing of a baby shortly after birth and is given as 2 numbers. The first number is the actual score, (this will be discussed a little later), and the second number (often written in superscript) is the time in minutes after birth. So in the example above the score would be 8 at 1 minute after birth and 9 at 5 minutes after birth. If the score is less than 7 at 5 minutes after birth then it would be common to continue scoring every 5 minutes until the score is 7 or above.
The score itself is based on 5 criteria these are
Heart Rate
Respiratory Effort
Muscle Tone
Reflex Response
Colour
Each one of these criteria can have a score of 0, 1 or 2. For example if the heart is not beating it would score 0. Below is the full listing for the APGAR scoring system

Heart Rate....................Score
Absent..........................0
Less than 100..................1
More than 100.................2

Respiratory Effort
Absent..........................0
Slow/Irregular.................1
Good or crying.................2

Muscle Tone
Limp............................0
Some flexion...................1
Active...........................2

Reflex Response
None.............................0
Minimal/Slight grimace.......1
Cough/Sneeze/Pull away......2

Colour
Blue/pale........................0
Body pink hands/feet blue....1
Pink all over....................2

Most babies have blue hands and feet when they are first born and this can be a scary sight especially for first time mums. The hands and feet can stay blue for many hours after birth.

Alan, as usual you are a legend.

I have always known what the scores were for vaguely......but the above detail really explains it properly.....thank you!

Thanks Alan, I too have roughtly known what they were, but not to this detail, once again you've out done yourself :)

The Midwife who delivered my DS didn't so his Agpars. When I asked her what they were, she sort of shrugged and said 9, 9. Like she just made them up. They didn them with DD, just not him. Maybe she thought there was no need, but I was a little dissapointed.

Do you do them with every birth?

Yes I do them at every birth and as far as I know every midwife I have worked with has done them at every birth

Thanks so much for the info, Alan :)
Natalie had really blue hands for a while after she was born... I look at the photos now and think it looks a bit freaky, though at the time I was just on such a high and she was crying her little heart out so I knew she was ok ;)