Answer to Question #127587 in Human Anatomy and Physiology for Rita Manandhar

Question

Claire is pregnant again, and it’s a girl! She and her husband Ben are excited to be expecting a little sister for their 2-year old twins James and Danielle. Claire has just entered the second trimester of her pregnancy, and has tried to keep as active as possible. 1. Claire is keen to learn from her experience as a mother and remembers that when her twins were babies, they became cold very easily which often disturbed their sleep (and hers!). Interpret this poorer thermoregulation as seen in a normal healthy baby, with regards to i. the structure of a baby’s skin, particularly considering heat-loss by a new-born baby, and ii. the mechanisms in which a baby’s body can respond to warm itself up/restrict heat-loss

Answer 1

Generally new born babies are incapable to maintain their body temperatures like adults would since they do not have the ability to shiver or perhaps exedrcise like adults. Commonly, babies loose heat greatly through convection when exposed to cold air and through conduction when exposed naked on cold surfaces. Structurally, the skin of new born babies are generally thinner compared to adults hence would more easily loose heat via convection in the air. Additionally, the subcutaneous layer of the new born skins are rich in highly saturated oils, palmitic and esteric acids with higher melting points compared to unsaturated fats in adults as more oleic acids are deposited as the skin matures.

Higher boiling points therefore means that the oils would freeze more easily, that is 64°C compared to 14°C in adults hence new born babies would loose more heat than adults. In addition, babies have a higher body surface area to weight ratio, typically three times greater compared to adults.

To generate heat, babies tend to increase their oxygen use during metabolism, such that a drop in temperature by 1°C would prompt an increase of up to 10% in the amount of oxygen used for metabolism. Babies in addition do burn brown fat, located at the neck, at the back around the spine to release heat. Brown fat in neonates is generally very essential in cautioning babies against hypothermia, a condition characterized by abnormal drop in temperatures in often babies.