It’s not a happy holiday thought, but an important one: The number of babies who die of SIDS, or sudden infant death syndrome, surges by 33 percent on New Year’s Day.
__________
sudden infant death syndrome
Dec
21
2010
SIDS spikes 33% on New Year’s Day
__________
A baby’s sleep position is the best predictor of a misshapen skull condition known as deformational plagiocephaly, the development of flat spots on an infant’s head, according to recently published findings.
Analyzing the largest database to date available, with more than 20,000 children, researchers found the number of babies who developed flat-headedness has dramatically increased since 1992.
__________
Images show babies sleeping in positions that increase risk of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS). More than one-third of the photos in women’s magazines depicted babies in unsafe sleep positions, according to a study published in the September 2009 issue of the journal Pediatrics.
The study also found that two-thirds of sleep environments depicted in these magazines were also unsafe.
__________
A study in the December 1, 2008 issue of the journal Sleep is the first to show that high levels of prenatal smoking exposure strongly modify sleep patterns in preterm neonates, which places infants at a higher risk for developmental difficulties that could persist throughout early and middle childhood.
Results indicate that preterm neonates born to heavy-smoking mothers who smoked more than 10 cigarettes per day displayed disrupted sleep structure and sleep continuity. From 7 p.m. to 8 a.m. they slept almost two hours less than controls who were born to non-smoking mothers, and their sleep was more fragmented. Compared with controls, neonates born to both heavy and low smokers displayed more body movements and, as a result, more disturbed sleep.
__________
Jun
16
2008
Smoking During Pregnancy Increases SIDS Risk
Clinicians have long considered smoking during pregnancy a major contributing risk factor for Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS), but had not proved a casual relationship. A new study using rats provides the most direct evidence showing a causal link exists, at least, between prenatal smoking and SIDS.
Other contributing factors include disturbances of breathing and heart rate regulation and impaired arousal responses, thermal stress (primarily overheating from too high temperatures or too much clothing) and sleeping in the prone (belly-down) position.
__________
Contrary to even the recommendations of its own section on breastfeeding, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) released an statement from its Task Force on SIDS (sudden infant death syndrome) the Academy of Breastfeeding Medicine has problems accepting. Recommendations that advise against parent-infant bed-sharing and support the generic use of pacifiers imply a “truly astounding triumph of ethnocentric assumptions over commonsense and medical research,” according to Nancy Wight, M.D., president of the Academy of Breastfeeding Medicine.
__________
