Neurological Examination of the Newborn Infant

A simple neurological screening examination should be performed on all term and preterm newborn infants, as part of the general medical examination. A full comprehensive neurological examination (NE) of the newborn infant should fulfill diagnostic and prognostic aims. As far as diagnosis is concerned, the NE needs to assess the severity of the acute (or subacute) brain dysfunction and to select those babies who may benefit from therapeutic hypothermia; the cooled newborn babies need to be assessed with serial NE during the first days after birth. As to the prognostic power of NE, repeated longitudinal assessment is needed in order to depict a developmental trajectory that better predicts the developmental outcome. The NE available for preterm and term newborn infants are discussed in relation to their peculiarities and strengths.