Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS)
Sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) is the unexpected death of a baby where
there is no apparent cause of death. The current rate of SIDS in Australia
is around one in every thousand births, or 250 babies each year. This compares
to about 500 babies lost to SIDS in 1990. This dramatic drop in the number
of SIDS cases is due to changes made in some childcare practices. However,
the suggested changes – outlined below – can only reduce the risk. A baby
can still die from SIDS, even if all these recommendations are followed.
Things to remember
● Always put your baby to sleep on their back.
● Make sure your baby’s head remains uncovered during
sleep.
● Keep your baby in a smoke free environment, before
birth and after.
● The risk of SIDS is increased if your baby sleeps
on their stomach. It is important to put your baby to sleep on their back
instead.
● Over time this may slightly flatten the back of
your baby’s skull, but any ‘positional moulding’ usually improves by itself
by encouraging small but frequent times of ‘tummy time’ when the baby is
playing on the floor.
● Make sure your baby’s head does not get covered
during sleep.
In some SIDS cases, the babies are found with bedding over their faces.
Some suggestions to prevent this include:
● Don’t put your baby on a water bed or bean bag.
● Don’t use soft bedding like quilts, doonas, duvets
or pillows.
● Use a firm, well-fitting mattress.
● Don’t use cot bumpers.
● Keep soft toys out of the cot.
● Position your baby’s feet at the bottom of the
cot.
● Tuck in the bedclothes securely.
● Keep the environment for your baby smoke free.
This includes people who smoke away from the baby then hold the baby with’
Smokey’ clothes.
● If either parent smokes during the pregnancy,
the risk of SIDS is increased.
● Babies exposed to tobacco smoke after birth are
also at increased risk of SIDS.
● Stop smoking before you conceive, or as soon as
you can into the pregnancy, because the less you smoke, the lower the risk
of SIDS. If your partner smokes, encourage them to quit.
● Make your house a smoke free environment at all
times and don’t allow anyone to smoke near your baby.
Other factors
There are factors that may have a bearing on the risk of SIDS. These factors
include:
● Make sure your baby doesn’t overheat or get too
cold – a good rule of thumb is to dress your baby as you would dress yourself,
to be comfortably warm.
● If your baby has a fever, use fewer bed coverings
or none at all.
● There is an increased risk of SIDS if a mother
who is a smoker shares her bed with her baby.
● Even if you don’t smoke, bedsharing can still
be unsafe if your baby slips under the bedding or into pillows, is trapped
between bed and the parent or the wall, falls out of bed, overheats, or
is rolled on.
● And of course, don’t bedshare if you have been
drinking alcohol or are affected by other drugs.
● Immunizations aren’t a risk factor – the highest
incidence of SIDS happens between the ages of two to four months, which
is coincidentally the same age that babies are often immunized.
● There is some evidence that immunized babies are
actually at a lower risk of SIDS than non-immunised babies.
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