The First Few Days with Baby

A timeline of infant care in the hospital.

Topic: Postpartum

Delivering a baby is both exciting and exhausting.

Being in the hospital offers you support in your initial days with your infant. However, some families also find it disruptive to their healing to have people enter and exit the room. If you are one of those families – be sure to use the sign on your door to help our caregivers know when you are resting.

Below are all the necessary infant check-ins before hospital discharge so you know what to expect for your baby.

Examining Baby

  • The pediatrics team may have been called to your delivery and will examine your baby at birth.
  • Every baby will be seen by the pediatric team on the first day of life.
  • Nursing staff will also check in on baby and let the pediatricians know if they need to come see the baby again.
  • These exams are meant to ensure your baby is healthy before they visit their pediatrician’s office, which is usually 1 to 2 days after hospital discharge.

The 12-Hour Check-In

  • This is when baby will get their first bath. On rare occasions we will give the baby a bath right after delivery, but for most babies we wait. This is because we want to give the birth parent and baby time to be skin-to-skin, to help with bonding and milk production for those who choose to breastfeed. Waiting until later also helps the baby to regulate their body temperature.
  • Every 12 hours we check your baby’s weight. We expect that almost all babies will lose weight after delivery and take about 2 weeks to regain it. We check the weight to make sure the babies don’t lose too much, and to check in on how feeding your baby is going.
  • Your baby’s first vaccine, the Hepatitis B vaccine, will be given.

The 24-Hour Check-In

  • After your baby is 24 hours old, infants will get all of their newborn screening tests. These tests are critical to making sure your baby is healthy early in life. There are four different newborn screens:
    • A hearing test
    • An oxygen test called the Critical Congenital Heart Defect Screen which looks at the function of a baby’s heart and lungs
    • A bilirubin level or jaundice check to see if your baby needs follow up or treatment for jaundice
    • A PKU test or newborn screening test where a little bit of blood from the heel of the baby will be sent to the state of Pennsylvania. This test looks for different hormonal, metabolic, and genetic disorders. The state runs this test and gets the result to your pediatrician in about 7 to 10 days. It is the only test where you don’t get the results in the hospital.

Hospital Discharge

  • Fill out all the required paperwork before leaving.

Schedule an appointment at your baby’s pediatrician for 1 to 2 days after you leave. In some cases, you can wait 3 days. Pediatricians like to see new babies 2-3 times in their first month of life. If you have trouble making an appointment let your pediatrics team know and they can help you schedule. It’s also ok to tell the pediatrician you are discharged even if you are still physically in the hospital but are going home that day.

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