| Title | Direct Computer Recording of Premature Infants and Nursery Care: Distress Following Two Interventions |
| Author(s) | Peter A. Gorski, MD; William T. Hole, MD; Carol H. Leonard, PhD; and John A. Martin, MD |
| Source | Pediatrics, Vol. 72, No. 2, Pages 198-202 |
| Publication Date | August, 1983 |
| Abstract | Prematurely born neonates are born with an immature nervous system. Temporal association between care-giver interventions and infant biobehavioral reponses can be recorded. A new methodology for continuous naturalistic computer-assisted recording of infants in nursery care is described. To illustrate a clinical implication of this recording, an infant's responses to two seemingly contrasted care-giver interventions were analyzed: chest physical therapy and close social interaction. There was significantly increased subtle as well as gross behavioral and physiologic distress following both chest physical therapy and close social interaction when compared with baseline distress incidence. Perhaps timing of interventions is as consequential as their content toward safeguarding a preterm infant's developing autonomic regulation, motor patterns, and sleep/wake state. |