Maternity quality and safety results

Coming to hospital for obstetric and maternity care 

When a baby is born at a Ramsay maternity hospital, we complete an Apgar score check at one minute after birth and again at five minutes after birth. Apgar is a simple assessment of a baby’s condition, which helps determine if they need additional medical assistance. A midwife or doctor checks the baby’s heart rate, breathing effort, muscle tone, reflex irritability and skin colour. Each of these is rated from zero to two and the sum of those five ratings makes up the baby’s total Apgar score. The Apgar score scale ranges from 1 to 10, with a score of 7 or above considered normal (which means the baby doesn’t require any 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.  

Sometimes during a vaginal birth, a vaginal tear can occur.  The indicator for surgical repair for fourth-degree vaginal tears is an indicator used to monitor the safety of maternal care. 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 born (Apgar) or women giving birth for the first time (tears) during the period.