INFANTS EARLIEST SLEEP WAKE ORGANIZATION DIFFERS AS A FUNCTION OF DELIVERY MODE/

The sleep/wake states of newborn infants were investigated as as a fun ction of vaginal and C-section delivery. The subjects were 51 normal f ull-term infants: 26 vaginally delivered, 12 delivered by emergency C- section, and 13 delivered by elective C-section. Their sleep states an d wakefulness were continuously recorded from the time of birth throug hout their stay in the hospital, that is, the first 2 postnatal days f or the vaginally delivered infants and 5 days for the C-section infant s. Sleep was recorded using the automated Motility Monitoring System, which permits 24-hr recordings without instrumentation of the subject. During the 1st postnatal day, both C-section group showed state patte rns that differed significantly from those of the vaginally delivered infants. Analyses for single states indicated that both C-section grou ps had significantly less active sleep, and the elective group had mor e wake and more sleep-wake transition than the vaginal group. The two C-section groups did not differ significantly on any measure. Only the vaginally delivered infants showed significant day/night differences during the first 2 days, with more wakefulness, shorter mean sleep per iods and shorter longest-sleep periods during the daytime on both days . The results of this study indicate that the earliest postnatal sleep patterns differ and the diurnal sleep rhythm is disrupted as a result of surgical delivery. (C) 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.