Two Week Follow Up Visit for Newborns

Two-week newborn follow-up overview 0:00

Hello again, it's Dr. Ott with The Doc and the Fam. I'm going to talk about the two-week follow-up visit for your newborn now, and I may add some things that also apply to the two-day follow-up as well. So we're always gonna be measuring head circumference, length, and weight for all of these well-child visits. And the reason is that how a baby grows is a super big health indicator. It's important. That's not to say that it's everything, but we do pay attention closely to that. We're gonna get stats, we'll be looking at them on a growth chart.

Growth checks and growth charts 0:34

There are several different growth charts. They have different strengths and weaknesses. So I typically recommend the World Health Organization growth chart as our preferred choice. Uh, I recommend that over the CDC. It's more representative of different, um, ethnic backgrounds. And, and it just is a small difference, but just to keep that in mind, if your baby has trisomy 21 or Down syndrome, or if you're baby is premature, there are different growth charts that we track those babies on. So keep in that mind as well.

So at the two-week visit, I am expecting to see a baby back to their birth weight. If they're over it, that's fantastic. But if they are back their to birthweight or over, then everybody can breathe a big sigh of relief. Ah, we made it back. That's great. Awesome. Good news.

Back to birth weight and feeding guidance 1:24

At this time, I tell parents, especially breastfeeding parents like, okay, we can relax a little bit. If baby goes four hours without a feed, that's all right. We still just want to make sure that they're getting close to eight per day. And that way you can have just a bit longer rest in between. Um, if you haven't started pumping yet, this is the time to start pumping. That way, you have a milk supply. on hand for when you're not physically available. That is helpful. And I also want to mention vitamin D.

Pretend that I said this in the two day follow up also. So vitamin d is important for breastfed babies. If you are formula feeding your baby, they add vitamin so you can discard this information. But if you were breastfeeding and I hope that you for the many, many many benefits to both mom and baby. Vitamin D is not Species, I think we once were.

Vitamin D for breastfed babies 2:25

So vitamin D, 400 IUs per day. Carlson's makes a good vitamin d drop where you just put one little drop on baby's tongue or on your finger and then baby mouth or your breast, however you want to transmit it to baby. It's meant to be one drop per days so that they get it every day and I know it's hard to remember. You will notice your pediatrician or primary care provider giving your baby a big exam. They're going to touch baby head, they're gonna look in the baby's eyes with an ophthalmoscope to look for something called the red reflex.

They will probably feel, um, baby, his mouth, especially the upper palate to make sure that all the palate is formed correctly,

Newborn physical exam at the visit 3:14

maybe under the tongue to makes sure we don't have tongue tie, which I talked about in one of the previous videos, they will try to looking babies, little ear canals. Although these air canels are very small right now and it's pretty hard to see the, the tympanic membrane or the um. eardrum, that's the word. They will listen to baby's heart, make sure that we don't have any concerning extra sounds like murmurs. they will watch baby breathe, makes sure they're breathing at a healthy rate of speed and they are not working really hard.

So a sign that baby is working hard to breathe at this age is a couple of things. You will see a baby doing some flaring with their nose. Let's see if I can flare. I'm not good at that or they'll be retracting which means they're sucking their ribs in a lot when they breathe or just you can see that it's a Lot more motion than when their relaxed or breathing comfortably Your doctor will feel belly and make sure that there's not a sign that baby's liver is really large. They will listen to belly or They will look at genitals, make sure that everything looks good.

If it's a boy part, makes sure everything is fine with the testicles coming down, etc. They'll do a little hip test. This is to make we don't have clicks and clunks in sign that hips might not be well formed in there. There also looking at baby's irritability, baby consolability. Baby's tone. So are they kind of up like this? That's normal or they like floppy like that's not normal for a baby at this time They're gonna be looking for capillary refill. That means when you press on baby's skin, is it stay white for long time or pale or It's a pigmented baby.

How long does it take to kind of pink back up? These sort of things. They're going to be looking at baby's eyes also for signs of jaundice and yellowness.

Heel poke screening and wrap-up 5:04

Looking at babies skin for rashes. Oh, there's so many raches in the newborn period. And looking for diaper rash because that'll be a thing too that you probably learn to deal with. So those are some of the overviews. And at the two week visit, you'll also usually get a little heel poke. This is the genetic screening or some people just abbreviate and call it PKU. So it's really important to do this at the time of birth or 24 hours after. And again, at two weeks of age, because some of those genetic illnesses don't actually present until they've been consuming milk for quite some time.

So this is a really one to get it done at that time, all right? So that is a pretty quick overview. I'm sure there are more things and we'll get to them, but ask me questions, send me comments, let me know what you'd like to hear more about and if this is helpful. Okay. That's your two week visit and I will make another video soon for the two month visit. Take care.