For infants, there is a certain risk of dying from a disease such as sudden death syndrome. Only preventive measures, which will be discussed in this article, help to avoid instant death. This happens as follows: if the child has difficulty breathing in his sleep, there is a risk of airway obstruction, which leads to tragic consequences. So far, doctors have still not been able to detect a tendency to this anomaly. Even an autopsy does not give doctors a hint of the cause of the disease. The study of the disease began in 1950, and only in 1969 the term “sudden death syndrome” appeared, and the corresponding diagnosis was first made.
Since this phenomenon is observed only in infants, the ailment later changed its name to the syndrome of sudden infant death. According to statistics, in Russia 0.43% of 1000 newborns die from it. After organizing a fund dealing with this problem, mortality decreased by 74%, but it was not possible to completely solve the problem.
Sudden death syndrome can occur for the following reasons.
- Sleeping on a stomach is the most common cause of death. Because of this, pediatricians changed the recommendation that the baby should sleep in this position. All experts now recommend laying the child on his back. As a result, the mortality rate decreased three times
- Your baby is wrapped too much while sleeping. Do not do this in any case, pediatricians recommend a night bag of optimal thermal insulation for your baby’s sleep.
- If your child sleeps on too soft a cover. Doctors do not recommend laying the baby on the couch or too soft bed. For unknown reasons, sudden death syndrome may occur in this case.
- If one of the children in the family has already experienced critical situations, such as cardiac arrest or respiratory arrest, this also increases the likelihood of SIDS in other babies.
- If the mother of the child already had serious illness before childbirth.
- If the mother has an interval between pregnancies of less than 1 year. If a woman has had miscarriages before giving birth, this can also contribute to SIDS.
- Smoking and drinking alcohol by the mother of the child, as well as the use of light and heavy drugs.
- Hard birth, after them the chance that SIDS will occur increases by 7 times.
- If the birth is too long, this increases the chance of the baby dying by 2 times.
- If the baby’s mother had a lot of stress before giving birth, the baby is also stressed. In such situations, the likelihood of death increases greatly.
- If the mother did not inform the child.
- The complete lack of breastfeeding and, in connection with this, the artificial feeding of the baby.
- Boys are more at risk than girls; according to statistics, they die in 61% of cases.
- The age of children who die from sudden death is from 2 to 4 months.
- In case you sleep in different rooms.
Doctor I.M. Vorontsov in 1997 introduced recommendations on what effective methods can avoid such a nuisance as sudden death syndrome. All methods are described in educational medical literature.
Ways to avoid SIDS are logically derived from the prerequisites for the disease described above. Here is a detailed list to help protect your child.
- You should put your child to sleep on his back, in no case on his stomach.
- The surface on which your baby will sleep should be hard.
- You need to put your child to sleep in a special bag for sleeping, in which there will be an optimum temperature. You can’t wrap the baby too tightly.
- You need to sleep with your child in the same room, let him lie in the crib next to you.
- Never smoke next to a child.
- Be sure to breastfeed your baby
By following these recommendations, you can protect your child from this terrible diagnosis. In no case should you be afraid, it is better to be careful and careful parents and to the best of your concern for your beloved children. Only in this case, you can protect your family from trouble and grief.