Sudden death: How not to position your baby when sleeping

He said children who died from SIDs had been shown to have been susceptible genetically or from the structural anatomy of their brain, but added that the major cause was laying the child facing down or sideways

Dr. Arikawe Adeolu, a Medical Practitioner at the Federal Medical Centre, Jabi, Abuja, says laying infants below one year face down or sideways increases their risk of dying from Sudden Infant Death Syndrome.
Adeolu disclosed said this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria on Thursday in Abuja.
He said at that age, the child was still learning how to wake up from sleep as two to four months of a child’s life the respiratory organs were just developing.
He said children who died from SIDs had been shown to have been susceptible genetically or from the structural anatomy of their brain, but added that the major cause was laying the child facing down or sideways.
He said that SIDs was more common in male infants than female infants, adding that it often occurred between 12 midnight and 9am.
Adeolu said: “Other risk factors are smoke inhalation.
“If a child is in a place where the parents smoke or the mother smoked while pregnant for the baby, it increases the risk for the child.
“Even when the baby is old enough, passive inhalation of smoke can increase the risk.
“Some women prefer to lay their baby facing down; they say this will enable the baby sleep longer but doing this restricts the breathing of the child, increasing his or her risk of dying from SIDs.
“The child does not yet have the ability to wake up from sleep so from birth to the first year of a baby’s life, he or she should lie on his back.”
Adeolu said once a baby was breastfed, the child should be carried on the shoulder till he burps to reduce the chances of vomiting when put to lie on his back.
Adeolu also advised that the baby’s bed be firm and not soft as soft beds increased the chances of a child burying his nose on the bed and suffocating.
He said: “This is because sometimes children like to turn and if the bed is soft there is a tendency that the baby will bury his nose on the bed and suffocate himself.
“It is also advised that you do not put too much clothing items or pillow near the child because this can increase the chances of suffocation.
“Do not sleep near babies because you can roll over and lay on them suffocating them without knowing.
“The child can be in the same room but not on the same bed as the adults.
“The temperature in the room where the baby sleeps should also be considered.
“It should not be too hot or cold because extreme temperature has been shown to increase the risk of SIDs.
“When you are covering the baby, ensure that the spread is under the hand of the child and do not cover the shoulder or legs with the spread because when babies are kicking around, they can kick the cover on their face and suffocate themselves.”
Adeolu said little attention was given to sensitisation and awareness of SIDs because only a little per cent of infants died from it.
He said more attention was given to other areas that were more responsible for infant death in the country such as malaria, diarrhoea and other infectious diseases.
He said that there was no local study in the country as to the number of children affected by SIDs yearly, adding that there is therefore no data or statistics to show percentage of deaths caused by it.
“But the American statistics shows that SIDs causes 0.5 out of a 1,000 deaths,” Adeolu said.

NAN