Is this parameter important enough that hospitals pay close attention to
regular official scale calibration and/or electronic scales of the same
type in both L&D and nurseries? Certainly didn't used to, long ago!

What about having two people watch the scale/record? I have seen so many
parents upset over weights that obviously had to be scale errors on
different scales in different locations (hospital vs. any of several
different exam rooms at the pediatrician's office, vs. WIC, all in a
48-96 hour time period.)

When it's all said and done, will we ever know which babies peed just
before exiting the womb, and therefore seem to have lost less weight by
the next day? Or what about the one who pees/poops right after arrival,
but before cord is cut/opportunity to whisk to the scale vs. the one who
pees/poops shortly after the first weight is recorded?

Maybe it would be possible to "kill 2 birds with one stone" by
re-thinking some routines? What about abolishing interruption of the
immediate holding/bonding period for anything beyond resuscitation?

Remove weighing from the list of tasks that the delivery nurse is
responsible for, especially at shift change? Might be a battle to abolish
completely, since even the delivering doctor, as well as dad, wants to
know. Being able to spout the birth weight as a symbolic part of the
first "brag" has always seemed so important a social ritual in our
culture.

Has anyone done any research on altering hospital routines to pick some
other arbitrary time (exactly 12 hours? exactly 24 hours after birth?)
rather than within the first hour and then whenever the next routine
weighings are done (when the baby wakes for the first feeding on x shift,
etc., meaning the baby could be a variable # of hours old when first
comparison weight is obtained?)

Sounds like some routines are continuing down through the years just
because "that's the way it's always been done." That was good enough for
us who worked in OB 35+ years ago before they began testing such things
as blood glucose and bilirubin levels, etc. so routinely. But it seems
like there is danger that the tail can wag the dog if weighing routines
aren't re-examined along with the times.

Just my $.02.

Jean
*********
K. Jean Cotterman RNC, IBCLC
Dayton, Ohio USA

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