Newborn around smoking friend

[Overthebow]

A friend who smokes came round today, he didn’t smoke in the house but could strongly smell cigarettes on him and he probably had one before he came into the house. I let him hold my baby for a while, and didn’t really think about it until afterwards but now I’m worried my baby will have been affected by this and am worried about sids. Do you think it’s ok and if not is there anything I can do? Aibu to be worried about this?

@Whoopaday I guess I'm not gonna be holding any babies any time soon then. I honestly didn't know that just the smell was actively harmful, but I get it that it's unpleasant. I don't try and mask the smoke smell with perfume, I just wear it like most people do. A lot of my family smoked around babies and kids as recently as 15 years ago. That's pretty bad isn't it. (Not me mind you). No-one ever smokes indoors in the family now. Or has a baby.

No in this case the research is there, and the guidance is starting to catch up.
So you are concluding that asking visitors to a newborn baby to remove their coat/change shirt after smoking is extreme and not based in medical fact because you’ve not seen those exact words ok the NHS general info site.
You’re ignoring all the guidelines that are starting to appear about thirdhand smoke (I can find you more if you want) as well as all the research.

@SnapCrackleandStop prematurely adopting rules that are not based in sound robust research isn’t without risk. I’m happy for you not to agree with that or to bring different experience to the discussion. I’m less relaxed about the repeated claims that this is recommended because I can’t see that it is.

This is an interesting paper that demonstrates that people do transport thirdhand smoke with them.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7056301/#:~:text=THS%20originates%20from%20the%20direct,not%20include%20airborne%20primary%20particles.
I get what you’re saying @TomeTome about waiting for recommendations but in this case the risk of the proposed harm reduction measure seems tiny or non existent. What harm is there in changing a shirt?

I think we will all have to agree to disagree with you on this one.
Sometimes science like this is glaringly obvious, if you want to see it. You are the type of person that unless it's written down it's not true and that's ok.

We will continue to do what we as HCP do and think and you likewise

This one is also interesting. The vast majority of the participants in this study are non smokers and still they found nicotine on their fingers from 3rd hand smoke exposure. The authors suggest NICU units might in future consider storing and laundering scrubs in the hospital to help reduce transmission to neonatal patients, or looking at stricter anti-smoking measures for parents and other visitors.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6662774/

Apologies I haven’t read the link yet. I think in this instance my guess would be the harm would be social/emotional rather than physical. New mother experiencing increased anxiety, baby experiences reduced contact with wider group, mother considered neurotic/controlling….

The analogy that springs to mind is the idea that was widely adopted without much scientific backing (so a theory that was adopted rather than proved) that “refrigerator mothers” caused autism in young children. It was observed that the mothers of autistic children damped down their emotions and were less responsive to their children. We know now that autistic children often have hair-trigger reactions to others emotions and their mothers would have been used to reducing that stress by remaining stoically calm. What then happened was that mothers shouldered much of the guilt and pain, some were instructed to force their children to hug for extended periods (holding therapy) causing enormous distress, in some countries (eg France) children and there siblings were removed from their families to try and protect them.

I am not suggesting anything like that would happen in this instance but I am suggesting that advice is not given lightly and the fact it hasn’t been issued isn’t an oversight but more there simply doesn’t appear to be the evidence to support it.

we will all have to agree to disagree with you well it won’t be all of you because several posters have said they feel it’s an unnecessary reaction/rule. I wouldn’t be particularly bothered if my thoughts were different to the majority though. Your opinions can stand on their own you don’t need to try and dominate in this way.

You are the type of person that unless it's written down it's not true and that's ok. that’s kind of you to say but you don’t actually know what kind of person I am. I’m fairly staunchly in favour of science rather than opinion especially when advising young mothers on how to care for their children. I’m not sure why you find that so offensive.

You seem to be taking this discussion very personally. It’s absolutely fine to disagree.

@TomeTome You are quite right not everyone has agreed with me. I did not think I was trying to dominate, so apologies if that's how I came across.

I am very passionate about every baby having the very best start in life and the right to not being exposed in any way to carcinogenic toxins that are in cigarette smoke. I know we cannot protect them from everything but in this I passionately believe we can.

In my field, still birth and fetal growth retardation are well researched subjects and with recommendations that have come from research the stats on this are, thank goodness, improving.

Having been to many midwifery study days involving both medics and midwives from various NHS Trusts, this seems to be the advice given by all.

I will always advocate for any sensible advice on what we know to date about passive smoking, especially around growth retarded, premature and vulnerable infants.

In my opinion, fwiw, with the knowledge we have re the toxicity of cigarette smoke/residue then I will continue to advise parents as I have previously discussed on this thread.

It's good to discuss and get others views and yes we can disagree amicably.

For what it's worth, I had a baby 2 years ago and on the hospital discharge from the midwife was explicitly told to ask any visitors to change their clothes and wash hands thoroughly after smoking, or not allow smokers to hold a newborn.
Having chatted to our NCT group about it at the time, we were all given the same advice across 3 hospitals.
So just because it isn't on the NHS generic info page doesn't necessarily mean it is "chinese whispers" or not current standard advice.

My friend is a smoker and if she held my baby afterwards (l was unaware this was a nono), the baby screamed and screamed. Almost like she knew! Op am sure baby is fine but be aware for next time x