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By Alan Mozes
NEW YORK, Mar 09 (Reuters Health) - Some infant deaths attributed to sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) may actually be caused by suffocation when parents share their beds with their infants, a new report suggests.
"An adult bed is not a safe place for a baby to sleep," said study lead author Dr. Cindie Carroll-Pankhurst, of Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio. Some deaths in very young infants that "have been classified as SIDS may actually have been preventable deaths," she added. Carroll-Pankhurst and Dr. Edward A. Mortimer, Jr. report their findings in the March issue of the journal Pediatrics.
The researchers looked at 84 infant deaths in Cleveland between 1992 and 1996 that were classified as SIDS deaths. The investigators found that at the time of their deaths, more than 30 of the infants were "bedsharing"--sleeping with one or more adults on either a bed or a sofa. Most of the time bedsharing involved the child's mother, and in one-third of cases it took place outside of a bed.
On average, bedsharing infants died at a younger age than non-bedsharing infants (9.1 weeks of age versus 12.7 weeks). Heavier mothers (84 kilograms, or about 185 pounds prepregnancy) were more likely to be bedsharing when the infant died compared with mothers who weighed less (147 pounds, or 67 kilograms prepregnancy).
Carroll-Pankhurst and Mortimer conclude that bedsharing may be a risk factor for SIDS-like deaths, most probably from suffocation after parents roll over or lay on their infant. While acknowledging that bedsharing may not always lead to suffocation--and that the study does not prove that bedsharing was the cause of the deaths--the researchers still suggest that the practice should be discouraged. That recommendation would join the caution against placing infants on their stomachs when putting them to bed.
Carroll-Pankhurst told Reuters Health that the new findings may help doctors learn what causes SIDS, which remains a mysterious and poorly understood syndrome.
SOURCE: Pediatrics 2001;107:530-536.
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