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New
Sids Risk
Doctors have long known that low-birth-weight infants are
at high risk for SIDS, but British researchers recently
discovered that poor weight gain in the first weeks after birth
may also be a factor. Comparing the weight gains of 247 babies
who died of SIDS with date on 1,110 healthy infants, they found
that the SIDS babies had significantly poorer growth rates in
their first six weeks. Even infants who were born at a healthy
weight but then gained too slowly were vulnerable. Because poor
growth can be apparent in the first weeks after birth, tiny
newborns should be closely monitored and steps taken if they
are not thriving.
Is
sleeping with my baby safe?
Can it reduce the risk of SIDS?
Infants and parents sleeping
together or in proximity to one another is how the human
infant's nutritional, social-emotional, and thermal needs
continue to be met worldwide. This includes Japan, where the
rates of SIDS are the lowest in the world. In most cultures,
parent-infant contact is thought to be as important during the
night as it is during the day. In contrast, the industrial
western world's accepted model of "normal" and
"healthy" infant sleep assumes that it is best for
the infant to sleep in isolation with minimal parental
intervention. But, infants were designed to sleep next to their
mothers for night time breastfeeding, so solitary infant sleep
represents a novel, if not alien experience, for which not all
infants, we contend, are equally prepared. Our work challenges
western assumptions on "normal" infant sleep in hopes
of uncovering hidden environmental co- factors heretofore not
considered to be relevant to some types of SIDS.
We do not suggest that sleeping
with an infant can prevent SIDS or that it is perfectly safe.
Indeed, where there are a variety of factors such as drug use
in the family, maternal smoking, and a lack of knowledge about
infant safety, co- sleeping might increase rather than decrease
dangers to the infant. However, the circumstances mentioned
above should not be confused with all co- sleeping situations.
The sensory exchange that co-sleeping provides an infant, i.e.,
heat, sound, smell, touches, and movement, are sensory stimuli
that the infant is designed to respond to in a positive way.
Co- sleeping requires that specific precautions be taken to
assure infant safety; this should not be mistaken for an
argument against the potential benefits to infants, any more
than a concern for crib design safety is an argument against an
infant sleeping alone.
Studies show that while
co-sleeping, infants breastfeed more frequently and for longer
total duration; they have more arousals many of which are
induced by the mother's movements or sounds, and that the
infants spend less time in the deep stage of sleep from which
some infants have difficulty arousing (apnea). We have been
impressed with both the mother's and infant's acute
responsiveness to the other's activities, all of which seem to
change the infant's physiology in ways that look potentially
helpful in resisting a SIDS event, although we cannot prove
this at this time.
In answer to the question, is it
safe to sleep with your baby? Under most circumstances
co-sleeping is likely to be very safe and beneficial; but it
depends on how it is done. If the parent(s) smoke or take
drugs, co-sleeping is risky. Sleeping with an infant on a
waterbed, couch, soft bed, or any bed that has gaps or ledges
into which the infant can fall, can be risky for the infant. It
is more ideal to sleep on a hard firm mattress, and to limit
your use of pillows and blankets.
In regards to the second
question, we do not yet know if co-sleeping can reduce the risk
of SIDS. It is clear that our research is yielding important
insights into the limitations of defining the species-wide
co-sleeping arrangement as "abnormal" while labeling
the culturally recent preference for solitary infant sleeping
as "normal" and always "healthy". We hope
someday to be able to use our data to contemplate new models of
healthy infant sleep to serve as a scientific beginning to help
combat SIDS.
Article by: James McKenna,
Ph.D., Professor of Biological Anthropology, Senior Researcher
SIDS Project, Sleep Disorders Center, University of California,
Irvine School of Medicine
Reprinted with permission from
Horizons, Vol. 1, No. 4, Spring/Summer 1995, California SIDS
Program
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All rights reserved. Permission to use, copy, and distribute
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On to Sids II
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