Coming to hospital for obstetric and maternity care

For all babies delivered at our Ramsay Health Care maternity hospitals an APGAR score is completed at one minute, and again at five minutes after birth. The APGAR score is a simple assessment of a baby’s condition at birth, which helps determine whether the baby needs any additional medical assistance. At birth, the Midwife and Doctor assess the baby’s heart rate, breathing effort, muscle tone, reflex irritability and skin colour. Each characteristic is rated from zero to two, and the sum of these five characteristics is the total APGAR score of the baby. The total APGAR rating scale is from 1 to 10, with a score of 7 and above being considered normal, and the baby doesn’t require additional medical intervention. The graph below shows the percentage of healthy babies born with normal APGAR scores. This is very similar to the industry average.

The indicator for surgical repair for fourth degree tear is an indicator of major complication of a vaginal birth. Ramsay Health Care participates in the Australian Council on Healthcare Standards (ACHS) Clinical Indicator Program and use their definitions for these indicators.

The APGAR indicator is reported as a percentage of births. The indicator for surgical repair of a fourth-degree tear is reported as a percentage of women giving birth for the first time. They are calculated by dividing the events that meet the indicator criteria by the number of babies or women giving birth for the first time during the period.