Emergency Xmas baby - with apnea monitor

Wow, I am surprised that they would place a little like that. Here, you have to do a little class to get medically fragile. Apnea machine qualifies. I'd recommend that you call your local neonatal unit at the hospital and see if one of the nurses can give you a tip or two. Even at the hospital, at least here, before discharge, the parents have to do a little training session.Good luck and enjoy him while you have him. :-)

What does it look like on him? Apnea monitors (if it is one) monitor the child's breathing, not heartrate. If the baby stops breathing for more than 30 seconds it will alarm. If it is monitoring the baby's HR it is a type of EKG. Either way, if it alarms, look at baby and see if he looks "dusky." Look at his lips especially as those will turn white and then blue if he isn't getting enough oxygen throughout his body. If he is, slap his foot, bottom (not hard, just to jolt him) or chest. You might see him take a deep breath then and he'll probably go right back to looking completely normal. If you can't get him breathing well, call 911 of course. Usually those monitors are precautionary, but they should have still had a bit more information for you than read the manual. That's silly. BTW, I'm a RN in the NICU... so we send parents home with these a lot!

Wow! That was fast. Merry Christmas:woohoo:

SarahBethsMommy- thanks for the info. this baby's IA worker really didnt seem to know what he was talking about. i asked "does this monitor his heartrate?" he said, "yes." i said "oh ok, i thought an apnea monitor was for breathing?" and he said "yeah, it is." the monitor says RESPIRONICS SMART MONITOR 2. on it are two displays with a flashing light for each. one has a heart symbol and the other a set of lungs. so i guess it really does monitor both?there is also a light that flashes to indicate the memory is full......? i havent figured what that is yet. the manual does say the monitor will sound an alarm if the memory is full. the alarm has gone off already which totally made us panic. Rockstar seems just fine, tho. good color, clearly breathing and even stretching his arms!any thoughts?thanks!

p.s. as to what it looks like on him, there are two little black tabs that stick to him kind of between his armpits and nipples with either a black or white wire coming out, and a cloth band that wraps around him to hold those in place.

That is the kind of monitor we send home with parents. It false alarms a LOT and because it is so loud you'll flip every time it does. Remember to look at the baby though. It false alarms because basically all it is doing is monitor the movements of the baby. So when he gets really still at night, the band can kind of "think" he has stopped breathing. Esepcially if he breathes very shallow while he sleeps or belly breathes (it is monitoring the movements of his chest). It is an apnea monitor but you'll see the HR kind of "flashing" on it. Because the heart pumps the blood around the body to take oxygen to all of your cells, if the heart rate drops low so does the oxygen levels, so like I said, you'll see similar stuff (the duskyness and such). Good luck and enjoy that baby!!

Oh and about the memory... it should not get full. It is HUGE. It records each time the baby stops breathing and stuff. The company that is monitoring him (usually a home health company) should come and download it way before it gets full, so I wouldn't worry about that.

Hi- enjoy your new little one! Our twin girls came home from the hospital on apnea monitors- later found to be totally unnecessary. Their monitors kept going off the first couple days because apparently, the heart rate was set so low (hospital requirement) that even crying a little would set it off. Then, the earth-shattering alarm would make them cry even harder, and it would go on and on. The worst thing was my husband and I kept stepping on cords, dislodging them, and then the alarms would go off again, making the girls scream, and starting it all over. A pediatrician here suggested we call the alarm company to see if they could reset the heart rate setting so it would not go off so much. Then, we saw a neonatologist here (home) that said take the monitors off now. Basically, what we determined was in the couple weeks we had the monitors, they would wear them at night, since they are great sleepers, so if anything went wrong, it would alert us. Otherwise, when we were with them, we just kept an eye on them and made sure their coloring was normal, etc. (I am definitely NOT suggesting you don't have the monitor on the baby when they have said it needs to be on.) In the end, we became very comfortable and it helped us gain confidence as 1st time parents (if that makes any sense) when every time those alarms went off it was a false alarm. Best of luck!

The monitor that you have does monitor both heart rate and breathing. My son is on the same one, and so was my daughter. There might be a sticker on it somewhere with the number for the home care company that supplies it. if you call that number, they should send someone out to train you. Everyone that uses the monitor should be trained. When it alarms, you should stimulate the baby. This might be by putting your hand on the baby's chest and gently moving him. This works for breathing, but not as well for low heart rate. Sometimes for low heart rate with my son, I need to pick him up and more him around, or even try to wake him up. If you turn the monitor over, there is a small screen on the bottom. This will tell you how many heart beats per minute and how many breaths per minute are being recorded. It will also tell you how full the memory is. The monitor is usually downloaded once a month. Please let me know if you have any other questions. As a disclaimer, this is not medical advice. I would strongly suggest that you call the baby's doctor or the home care company for child-specific directions.

ohhhhh, they should have sent someone out to train you before leaving you with it. we had in home training, took an hour and we got training hours towards our yearly qequired hours.

I haven't read all of the responses so sorry if I am repeating. 1st, that apnea monitor came from a health care company. The name is on it somewhere and there is a number for service on it. Call it. There are respiratory therapists on staff at these companies that teach parents how to use the monitor. Apnea monitors monitor both heart rate and breathing. Most of the alarms you get are going to be false. Just check the baby when they go off. Make sure the baby is breathing and heart is beating. My biggest "mommy tip" on apnea monitors are to see if you can get diapers with stickies instead of Velcro. That way you can stick the cords to the diaper leaving a bit of slack between the chest and diaper. This will help the wires from coming loose. Placement of the wires should be in the manual but basically, white on the right. About nipple level. Best of luck! What a Christmas present!

Thanks to everyone for the info and advice. Our little guy went home today. He was here for only 5 days, just long enough for Mom to detox. After that first night with him we didn't have any other problems with the monitor, thank goodness! He was a cute little baby, but... I think we might take a little break from drug addicted babies for a while! I think our girl, Mrs. President, needs to be the only special needs baby in the house for a little longer. :) Maybe in a couple of months we will try again.

I have sleep apnea also, diagnosed prior to being pregnant and I never got around to treating it...pregnancy definitely made it worse and plus my asthma got much worse too. Got my CPAP machine from that TOP list at the end of August and the other posters are right--it's more for your own health. They worried about my asthma being uncontrolled and affecting the baby, but that is because it's more of a steady state deprivation while sleep apnea's serious impacts are over the long term.My sleep doc did say not to expect to notice a significant change if you start using your cpap while pregnant (ie feeling more rested or energetic) but it will make you keep breathing through your sleep! It can take a few tries to get the right mask and settings and all so definitely get them moving...not something you'll want to be dealing w when you have a newborn!