It is usually a routine to weigh the baby every morning, during the first two or three weeks and once or twice a week afterwards. Premature babies and those who are very frail are weighed at longer intervals because of the inadvisability of disturbing them so often. The baby is undressed for his bath, wrapped in a blanket, and laid in the scoop or basket of a beam scale (Fig. [153]) and a note made of the entire weight, for if he is placed in the scales without protection he is likely to be chilled and frightened. The weight of the blanket is ascertained separately and deducted from the total thus giving the baby’s exact weight.
The eyes should be bathed first, with pledgets of sterile cotton dipped in warm boracic acid solution, each pledget being used but once. To prevent the solution from running from one eye into the other, the baby’s head is turned slightly to one side and the lower eye wiped gently from the nose outward. The lids may then be separated by placing one thumb below the brow and lifting it slightly, and the eye flushed with a gentle stream by squeezing a freshly soaked pledget just above it. The head is turned to the other side and the eye on that side bathed in like manner.
The mouth is swabbed out very gently with boric-soaked cotton wrapped about the tip of the little finger, care being taken not to abrade the delicate mucous lining. The nostrils are cleaned with little spirals of cotton dipped in liquid petrolatum or olive oil.
The face is then washed with warm water, no soap, and patted dry. The scalp, neck and ears are washed with soap and water and thoroughly dried by patting and wiping gently in the creases. The body should then be well soaped, with the nurse’s hand, only one part being exposed at a time, to avoid chilling. To place the baby in the tub the nurse may slip her left hand under his head in such a way that his head will rest upon her wrist, her fingers support his shoulders and her thumb curve over and hold the upper part of his arm. She may then grasp his ankles with her right hand and lower the little body into the water, feet first. If his arm and shoulder are firmly held and supported by the left hand it is an easy matter to steady the entire body and keep the baby’s head out of the water while giving the bath with the right hand. (Fig. [154].) The new baby is not usually kept in the tub for more than two or three minutes, but when he is three or four months old he may stay in for five minutes and still longer as he grows older.
Fig. 154.—Method of supporting baby’s head above water while giving tub bath.
Hot water should not be poured into the bath after the baby has been placed in it but cold water is often added, for a three or four months old baby, or the warm bath followed by a quick sponge with cold water. The little body is quickly patted dry and rubbed briskly with the palm of the nurse’s hand; the legs and arms stroked toward the body; the back from the neck downward and the chest and abdomen with a circular motion. Babies who react well to cold baths are benefited by them but such “toughening” methods have to be tempered to the resistance of the individual baby and are employed only under the supervision of the doctor.
Fig. 155.—Preparation for circumcision. (From photograph taken at The Cleveland Maternity Hospital, with description, by courtesy of Miss MacDonald.)
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