To think a lot of parenting guidance is flawed?

[Cellocecilia]

I am a scientist by ‘trade’ and since having my first daughter at the end of last year I can’t get over how flawed much of the official advice/guidance and even medical instructions are around new babies. Honestly as an analytical thinker having DD has been a bit maddening in terms of analysing all the information coming my way.

For example, I had a c-section and was told I couldn’t lift anything heavier than my baby, she was born 6lbs. People have babies twice that size. So that’s flawed advice. There objectively must be a maximum weight people post op should lift. I however suspect that might be less than some babies weigh and therefore the NHS don’t want to be telling new mothers not to lift their own babies, or it’s more than an average baby but they don’t trust the masses to correctly assess the weight of objects they wish to move.

Secondly the ‘don’t roll a baby onto their front to sleep, but once they can roll themselves onto their front you don’t need to roll them back’ physiologically there is no difference in position or sleep safety if a baby is rolled onto their front or they roll themselves onto their front, if they can roll from front to back.

The guidance seems to be based on it not being practical to expect or tell parents to sit up all night rolling their babies back over, not because it’s safe for babies to sleep face down if they roll themselves there. There is also some argument that by the time most babies can roll from back to front they’ve got past the most dangerous months for SIDS and their breathing is more mature.

Same applies to the safe sleep guidelines, it doesn’t help that all the ‘recent’ guidance was published at the same time so no one really knows what factor contributed the most to the reduction in SIDS. For example the theory on why it’s better for a baby to sleep in it’s parents room until 6 months is based on the fact that noise from parents will prevent baby from falling into too deep a sleep, this would be achieved by just having white noise, soft music playing or a fan on.

I put in a FOI request to the lullaby trust to get access to the data sources for their safe sleep guidelines and it’s a very interesting read to say the least.

So AIBU to be so frustrated by the lack of scientific basis for most of the guidance we are given as new parents?

Why are you so convinced that you know better than the experts that have spent many years trying to reduce cot deaths?

You're not being unreasonable. But it the era of social media, I doubt things will improve.

You need Emily Oster’s books OP

I put YABU.

The guidelines - and that what they are not laws - are to cover everyone.

There are posts on MN of people doing very unsafe or unhygienic practices with their newborns and toddlers.

Also some of the information that is used to develop any of the guidelines is a best guess because no one knows for certain.

How many years research into the prevention of SIDS have you done?

You got it it in your second paragraph. You can’t trust “the masses” so some stuff has to be simplified or over cautious, but it is evidence based to a large degree. Honestly if you have worked with the public for 25 years in any kind of advisory capacity you will get why you can’t leave people to work it out for themselves (or you’ll be a nicer more optimistic person than me).

Simple guidelines that everyone can understand are important. Of course it's not practical to tell woman they can't lift their baby because it's too heavy, but they can suggest you don't lift anything else too heavy. Nothing heavier than your baby is a rule that is simple to communicate, understand and remember.

You don't need to follow all the guidelines if you disagree though. I agree that there is no difference between them rolling onto their front, and them being put onto their front (once they can roll). My DDs would both roll immediately after being put down asleep or awake. Practically speaking it wouldn't have made a difference if they'd be put on their front in the first place, since they ended up there 2 seconds later. We tried rolling them back, but they just woke up and rolled back. Every. Single. Time. So while we didn't put them down on their front, we didn't roll them back.

Surely guidance needs to be a mix of practicality and science?
There is no point coming out with something that is unachievable.

It’s not about just any kind of noise - it’s specifically the sound of adults breathing.

Never said I do, I’m saying the guidance is flawed, as is shown by looking at the raw data behind the guidance.

As I said it doesn’t help all the guidance was issued at the same time, so there is no way to tell which piece of advice is more important.

Also common sense dictates some of my view. There is physically no difference in terms of being able to breath when face down if a baby is out there vs rolling over on their own, if they can roll themselves back. That is a basic fact.

It’s definitely over simplified, especially around recovery from birth. The very fact I could have given birth to a child twice the weight of my own proves the guidance around not lifting anything heavier than your own baby is bullshit.

Im just shocked there isn’t a definitive answer on a safe weight to lift, there is for other types of surgery (my mother recently had a mastectomy and was told not to lift anything heavier than 2kg for the first 4 weeks)

Exactly this

These messages aren't there to be 100% accurate

They are there to have the biggest impact among the biggest number of people

Same with all public health advice

YABU. There are several factors which increase the risk of SIDS, sleeping on front, overheating, smoke/alcohol/drug use by parents etc. Why on earth would you begrudge following advice based on years worth of research, knowing it is helping many families make more informed decisions about how to care for their children.

The only reason I can think is that you feel inconvenienced by it, babies are hard work. The advice The Lullaby Trust has given has made a huge difference to the numbers of babies dying of SIDS. Afaik they are have vowed to keep researching until they know exactly what is going on. Good for them I say, and lucky us that people care.

But it’s not. The conclusion of the specific studies used to form the lullaby trust guidance all state it’s noise in general, a few even split out babies who slept with fans and white noise and it showed the same impact.

Some studies theorised parents could intervene if they noticed any issues with their baby, as a secondary reason for sleeping in the same room, but this relied on the parents being awake or close enough to the babies sleeping space to hear any slight concerns.

I always assumed it was safer for a baby who can roll themselves because they are able to roll back but a baby who can't roll is stuck on their front no matter what.

They do have to be practical too like you said.

OP is talking about babies who can roll. Once they can roll onto their fronts themselves, the advice is still that they must always been out down on their back.

Isn’t is a case of non rolling baby, face down, less likely to be able to roll into a safe position if struggling. Whereas confident roller, more able to move? Also I thought face down baby was more likely to aspirate milk due to windpipe sitting in front.

You kind of did though, with your ‘I’m a scientist’ opening sentence. It came across very much, I’m a scientist so I know better.

I’m a physicist, doesn’t mean I know anything about safe sleeping positions for babies.

Not inconvenienced at all, i just don’t enjoy flawed guidance being put forward as biblical fact.

For example once you strip out the suffocation deaths included in many of the studies the lullaby trust used to form their safe sleep guidelines the data isn’t even statistically significant. It’s why there is an age disparity in terms of ‘SIDS’ deaths, with 80% happening when a parent is under 20. This is because in many studies they include basic suffocation deaths in the SIDS numbers, for example those that rolled onto their baby or fell asleep on the sofa and crushed their baby. Those aren’t technically SIDS deaths, but in many studies they’re counted.

Came here to say this.

Based on her other comments, I don't believe so.

Whatever you do, don't look into vaccination and vaccination schedules.

The current vaccination schedule is not based on what is best for baby, but instead on what will ensure maximum vaxination take up. Yeah, on a population level, may be best. Or may not, since nno-one has properly assessed the differnece of delaying vaccination, particularly in breast fed babies.

And that might lead you to wuestion covid responses, PCR and then mRNA vaccines.

Or you might look at screening tests like cervical smears or beast screening - where other countries get a really informative brochure, but we just get told 'do it or die',

And all this is religion on mumsnet and elsewhere. You question any of it at your peril, and people who gave up science at 'O' level or earlier will tell you you're a fuckwit because some random scientist says something.

Unless that scientist is Linus Pauling, or Luc Montagnier, or any other (Nobel-prize-winning) scientist who dared go rogue.

Nope, didn’t say I knew better, more that as someone who spends their entire life analysing data this has been a bit of a pet peeve of mine.

Most of the data sources the lullaby trust used also included suffocation deaths in their numbers, which really skews the data.

From the data the biggest factor is baby having their own space to sleep. The issue is the surrounding guidance which doesn’t have as much scientific basis behind it

You are a scientist. People become parents who struggled to or didn't finish school. Or who have art PhDs.

Do you want them to ask, hmm, what's your educational background? You started a business after school? It's a publicly traded company now? High school, ok, here's the high -school level pamphlet. And liberal -arts, non-scientific pamphlet for your husband.

You understand that health professionals need to communicate important information to a wide range of people.

"Don't lift anything heavier than a baby." Easy to understand.

Do you want them to say: The majority of studies indicated that the upper limit for lifting is 10kg, and provided that the patient is not in the top ten percentile for obesity and provided that there were no complications, 90% of women should be able to safely lift up to ten kg, but ten percent suffered surgical stitches coming lose when lifting over 5 kg, so to err on the side of caution an upper limit of 5 kg is advised.

Or just 'don't lift anything heavier than your baby.'

You are free to read all the peer-reviewed articles on everything. You can make an informed choice.

There are people who last read a book in school. They also need information to keep their babies safe and alive, and that information needs to be digestible.

👍this