Co-Sleeping - Apparently "especially dangerous" with babies less than three months

[RockinSockBunnies]

Just came across this online. Whilst I appreciate the dangers of drinking/taking drugs and co-sleeping, surely it's somewhat draconian to condemn all parents that choose to co-sleep with babies less than three months?

In addition, the death of the sixteen-month baby seems odd. Most babies this age are crawling if not walking and unlikely to be rolled upon by someone who has had a 'moderate' amount to drink.

These articles make me really cross . I co-slept with DD from birth, read numerous books on the subject whilst pregnant and consulted as many people about it as possible. I don't appreciate having my decision labelled 'especially dangerous'.

Not necessarily, cocoa. There is a growing body of evidence which suggests that it may be the physical separation at night from the parent which contributes to cot death rather than an illness per se. That the close immediate proximity of the mother is what prevents the death, by preventing or interrupting a potentially fatal apnoea attack.

In which case some cot deaths could be prevented by co-sleeping.

The last I read, cot death risk could be decreased by giving the baby a dummy.

So a non-dummy baby who co-sleeps could be at risk on two counts!

There is physical separation froma mother at the time of birth - do adopted babies suffer this risk?

Dummies increase the risk of cot death actually, the report is put over very carefully! If a baby who sucks a dummy doesn't have it in all night then it's at higher risk than if it never had a dummy. There's plenty of information out there, just do a quick Google. Remember FSIDS is run by bereaved parents so their reporting reflects that and dummy advice is sponsored by MAM.

90% of infant death happens in the cot, 10% happens elsewhere - car seat, bouncy chair, sofa, parents bed, floor... Not all deaths in an infants own bed are from illness - in fact SIDS isn't an illness, that's the whole point of a SIDS diagnosis, it's unexplained!

Of the deaths that do happen in parents bed they're either unexplained/ SIDS or the parents haven't followed co-sleeping guidelines.

I missed out, not all overnight accidental deaths happen in the parents bed either, babies die of accidents in their own cot.

Taking all of that into account still 90% of infant death happens in the cot.

Cocoa, I'm referring to separation during sleep time, ie baby in a cot vs baby next to mum in bed.

I think the dummy advice is redundant in the case of bf mothers, if I recall coreectly... and this is the group whch is most inclined to co-sleep.

Advice in the UK is often at odds with facts, and sometimes has to overcome some serious resistance to change. An analogy is the advice about not eating peanuts in pg and whilst bf. It seems likely that this advice is causing, not preventing peanut allergies in children.

I think the weird disproportionate fears people have over co-sleeping will reduce when more studies are publicised in due course.

I have to say that I co-slept with both by ds from birth and for me it was the safest place for them to be. They we both nightmares when it came to sleeping in cots so it was necessary for my sanity too but they seemed instinctively more secure with me next to them. Mind you this is with just me and the baby in a double bed no dh.
I just seemd like the natural thing for me to do!

Vic, I'm glad you picked that out from the report too-I found it hard to understand why such a conclusion was jumped to when there appeared to be no evidence for overlaying, but thought I must have missed something. Appears I haven't and it's another piece of scaremongering.

Vic- I also read something about laminate floors causing more allergies to dust etc - something about them having to be kept cleaner than carpets- which kind of absorb dust (euuuuw) whereas laminates just hold it on the top...and also because the children with these spotless floors aren't building up any immunities...

Almost all children co-sleep in China and apparently they have no word or concept of "cot death". I believe it's something to do with the proximity of the mother's heartbeat stimulating theirs should apnoea occur.

Would never not co-sleep personally.

Hang on a minute, it says at that the cause of death was unexplained;

"Mr Payne gave an open verdict in both deaths and said that no pathological evidence could be found to indicate that overlaying had happened, where either parent had accidentally suffocated them in bed.

In both cases, the cause of death was unexplained."

So why the need to go into all the detail about alcohol and so on. This appears to be SIDS. If the children had been in a cot when it had happened would we have got all the detail about alcohol levels and so on?

We have no way of knowing what has really happened here but the first question that jumps to my mind when a child dies of unexplained causes in their sleep is 'had they recently had a vaccination?'.

There is an increasing body of evidence that links SIDS (which is after all just a term to say we haven't a clue what happened) to adverse vaccine events.

Beachcomber - the parents of the 3 month old had already been arrested for being drunk when looking after him. Before he died, she was so pissed she'd passed out on the floor

I think alcohol is highly relevant in that case, don't know about the other one.

The 'Dummy recommendation' is based on a very small study which 1. has not been replicated by any other researchers 2. has had holes poked in it when it was peer reviewed and is considered very weak

I find it amazing that the FSIDs has trumpeted up this study but has not made anyone aware of the problems with the data.

So many parents are potentially being put into a sense of false security when giving their babies a dummy, IMO, until further data is revealed which either collaborate or refute the findings of above.

What is worse, is that it makes parents insecure when they do not want to give their baby's a dummy.

The only winner in this scenario is MAM who sponsors the FSIDS. sceptical? moi?

Cocoa, if your Baby has a higher likelyhood to die from SIDS when tey sleep in their own cot (which seems to be the fact that that is possibly so)...why place them there? Why take the risk?
See, the argument can be truned around so easily!

Can I put this leaflet into the discussion so that people can ruminate on how alcohol, smoking and drugs, illicit or no, can affect parents who choose to co-sleep and their babies.

It isn't rocket science. It is well known.

Rather than telling the Maoris to stop bed sharing, which they have always traditionally done, the NZ health authority began to advise on safe cosleeping practices in at risk families. The Maori infant mortality rate of babies dying in adult beds disappeared to nearly nil once the education drive began.

Of course, it is not just relevant for the Maoris, it is relevant to everyone who want to share best practice when it comes to bed sharing.

Here unfortunately, it is lazier easier to give the blanket recommendation that no one should bed share with babies.

Vlc, you?re right, if you?re breastfeeding and cosleeping the baby has something available to suck - the sooner we can drop the phrase ?human dummy? from our language the better IMHO, after all it does mean ?human fake human?. Dummies can have a major impact on breastfeeding too. I think it?s very sad that by following this advice babies are going to be put into another at risk category because they?ll end up needing formula when the dummy causes breastfeeding to fail.

Spicemonster, she may have been but if they found that alcohol wasn?t a cause in the death then it was relevant to the death. Of course it is relevant to the authorities because she was neglectful, but the child didn?t die because of that neglect.

Foxytocin, I must be sceptical too. I have also noticed their cosleeping advice is sponsored by a cot mattress manufacturer. In FSIDS defence though they?re made up of bereaved parents so they?re going to have a biased view of SIDS and be a little extreme as a result. I think a lot of people think they?re a govt agency and they?re not, they?re an independent charity.

I don't care what they say, I think it's safer to sleep with your baby, especially early on, as long as you're not drunk or on medication. Before my daughter was born I insisted that I'd never co-sleep because I thought it was a dangerous thing. One night of doing it (the night she was born) was enough to convince me that it was safe. There's no way I could have rolled on her. No-one should be drunk in charge of a baby, whether they're in the bed with you or not.

The thing is, because you are breastfeeding, neither you or your baby go into the 4th stage of sleep which means that you and your baby are more easily roused so a case of dangerous sleep apnea is less likely to occur.

So, why give a dummy to a bfing baby when dummies by crudely imitating breast feeding is trying to replicate what a baby should be having physiologically at that age.

this is where FSIDS trips up and puts breastfeeding and babies at risk of their own advice.

Givethedogachristmaspud, sorry to hear about your sister .

Sadly there are lots of stories like hers but the last thing the government wants to do is investigate them.

And the breastfeeding position is the perfect position to sleep in; you can't move away from your baby because they need to feed - I've rolled backwards slightly, still in the cuddle curl position, and had Tink yelling at me to get back! - and because you don't go into the deepest stage of sleep you quickly realise yourself if you are trying to move away. If I needed to roll I would roll forwards, hug her in and roll the other way, she never even noticed.

ChristmasFairy, sorry to come back to this so late.

What I was trying to say earlier is that the Peter Blair data seems to indicate that co-sleeping infants were at increased risk of SIDS and in addition there would be a risk of these infants being suffocated by overlying.
It does not matter (statistically) if 90% of SIDS take place in a cot, what matters is the proportion of those babies who co-sleep who die of SIDS compared with those who sleep in a cot. The Peter Blair presentation (looking at second slide on the left on page 4) suggests that there is an increased risk to co-sleeping above room sharing in a cot which seems to be the safest option (unless you know what he means by partial-bedsharing?).

How can there be an increased risk? If that was the case there would be far more babies dying in parents beds than there is. That 10% isn't babies in parents bed, that's babies that aren't in their own bed, so they could be in a car seat, bouncy chair, the sofa, the floor, pushchair, pram... as well as the parents bed.

Meant to had, clearly alcohol, smoking and excess tiredness significantly increase the risks of bedsharing and whilst it's possible to eliminate the first two the third is pretty much a given in the care of a baby less than 3 months!

Another point is that I think I have to consider how I would feel, apart from devastated, if a dc of mine died of SIDS or overlying whilst co-sleeping. Somehow I think that I'd feel more personally to blame than if they had died in cot beside my bed. Obviously I hope that those ideas remain just that but it is something to think about. So yes,Iit's important to recognise that FSIDS is ran by bereaved parents and their bereavement will colour their views but it also gives me an opportunity to reflect upon how I would feel in their position. I recognise that this argument is very personal to me and I would not in any way wish to upset anyone who has been through the experience of the death of a child.

X posts Tinsel, look at the slide I refer to, it shows that the relative risk of SIDS in co-sleepers is 1.35 compared with 1 in controls (room sharers in a separate cot). Another slide does show strong influence to alcohol intake and smoking though which I agree is likely to sway this relative risk but it is there. Please look at the slide.

Personally the fact that it was SIDS which is by it's very nature unexplained, I would be grateful that my child had died in my arms at least.

I can say that because I am a bereaved parent who's child did die in her arms. When my daughter was said to be alive I didn't think twice about taking her, I knew she would die and I wouldn't want to die on a side somewhere, I'd want to be in my mum's arms!

I would never take a child into my bed unless I was sure it was safe. I used to put her in her own bed when she fell asleep at night, she would wake about the time we went to bed when we would take her in with us for the rest of the night. If I thought there was any reason she shouldn't come in I would have put her back in bed and I have done.