80 PHYSIOLOGY OF THE JNEW-BORN INFANT. 



DISCUSSION OF RESULTS. 



The data we have accumulated in this study of new-born infants 

 permit a reasonably complete discussion of several phases of infant 

 katabolism, particularly the character and the amount of the katabo- 

 lism and the physiological needs of infants during the first week after 

 birth. 



CHARACTER OF THE KATABOLISM. 



Though previous observations with adults and animals give us no rea- 

 son to expect any particular kind of katabolism with new-born infants, 

 except that which may be due to the character of the food-supply and 

 possibly to muscular work as in severe crying, nevertheless since it is 

 commonly believed that there is an excess of glycogen in the body of 

 the new-born infant, it is necessary to examine carefully the character 

 of the katabolism during the first week, if not, indeed, during the first 

 hours of life. Such a study will give evidence as to the probable gly- 

 cogen content of the body, or, more specifically, the availability of the 

 glycogen content for supplying the needs of the body in the absence 

 of the ingestion of food. 



It was possible to determine the respiratory exchange of the infants 

 by means of the respiration apparatus, and from these data to calculate 

 the respiratory quotient for practically all of our observations. As has 

 already been pointed out in our description of the technique, the 

 greatest errors are liable to appear in the determination of the oxygen 

 consumption, as this requires an exact knowledge of the temperature, 

 humidity, and barometric pressure inside the chamber. Since this 

 error may be minimized by measuring the oxygen consumption in 

 long periods, it has been our custom to determine the oxygen consump- 

 tion for the entire time that the infant was inside the chamber, sub- 

 dividing the observations into periods upon the basis of the carbon- 

 dioxide measurements. In certain observations these periods were 

 made long enough to obtain fairly accurate respiratory quotients for 

 the individual periods. This is particularly the case with the infants 

 studied immediately after birth. Our data are therefore sufficiently 

 extended to permit us to discuss the respiratory quotient of the new- 

 born infant during the first week of life and particularly during the 

 first 24 hours following birth. 



RESPIRATORY QUOTIENT DURING THE FIRST 24 HOURS OF LIFE. 



The greater part of our evidence in regard to the respiratory quotient 

 during the first 24 hours of life was obtained in those observations 

 which were specifically designed to study this question, namely, those 

 in which the infants were observed almost immediately after birth. 

 The periods were for the most part 1 hour long and therefore may rea- 

 sonably be expected to give satisfactory determinations of the oxygen 

 consumption. The results are given in abstract in table 10. 



