My recent inactivity is largely due to being insanely busy at work. On the upside, I regularly do baby checks, which for some reason get a bad rep among many doctors I work with. Several of the paediatrics trainees I work with currently find them boring and repetitive - which I can understand, as you do end up battling with dozens of intractable newborns every day to get them to (a) open their eyes and (b) not urinate on you.
There are lots of fun bits, though - the parents are normally in that fug of post-delivery hormones/relief and enjoy having baby MOTed. Some of them, though, do come out with some really extraordinary things.
One part of the check, for instance, involves putting a finger into baby's mouth to check the palate feels intact, and to assess baby's suck. Generally they are unsurprisingly good at this as it's how they feed, and I normally say something like "the palate feels fine and he/she's got a good strong suck". This often prompts mum to wince and say "I know". On one memorable occasion, however, dad piped up instead:
"Just like mummy!"
...and then sniggered. Mum took a playful swing at him and, feeling it best not to probe, I carried on with the examination.
This was noticeably better than the parents who were worried about baby jerking his arms in his sleep. They described a completely normal twitching of the arms during sleep which baby then proceeded to demonstrate to me, so I told them it was nothing to worry about.
Dad: "Can I tie his hands together to stop him doing it?"
Me: "Well, you can certainly swaddle him and keep his arms in that way, yes."
Dad: "And can I tie his hands together?"
Me: "No. No - don't tie his hands together. Just let him wave his arms around a bit. It won't hurt him."
I refrained from going on: "whereas your tying his hands together will", but am now slightly concerned this was a mistake.
-
