Infant Sleep Safety - Lessening the Dangers of Cot Death
Even though the number of baby deaths have been reduced by approximately 40 percent by taking a number of preventative approaches and following baby sleep safety techniques to protect youngsters from SIDS, there is not a way to fully evade the occurrence of cot death.
Tips for Baby Sleep Safety
*Ensure your baby sleeps on his or her back. Sudden Infant Death Syndrome has been closely linked to children sleeping on their tummies.
*Ensure your baby sleeps on a firm mattress. Avoid certain fluffy toys or baby pillows that could
cause suffocation.
*Don't let your child get too hot throughout the night. infants have a higher body temperature than adults and do not need so many blankets - do not let Infant be cold either though!
*Don't take drugs, smoke or drink alcohol either before or after your baby's birth. Smoke from cigarettes is known to be a contributing factor to SIDS.
*Go along to early and parental care clinics, in particular if you are a parent for the first time.
*Breast feed Infant if it is possible. Breast fed babies are statistically much less likely to be affected by SIDS.
*Consider giving your child a pacifier throughout the initial 12 months of life. It is not known why but infants that are given a pacifier during this time are much less likely to be claimed by Cot Death.
*do not sleep with Infant in the same bed or let Infant sleep in a normal adult bed. A baby has an increased chance of suffocating when in a bed that is designed for adults. It is fine to comfort and feed Infant in bed as long as you return him or her to his or her proper cot afterwards.
SIDS is not the same as any other disease or syndrome. Most conditions surrounding the death of an infant are diagnosed by A symptoms associated with the death. Cot Death however is only normally diagnosed once other possibilities are dismissed.
Risk Factors
There are a number of notable risk factors or specific trends that can be observed in data regarding SIDS. All of these should be noted and addressed by mothers and fathers that have infants in a high-risk category.
*Boys are more likely than girls to die from SIDS. There is nothing much that can be done about this fact, it is included here as a notation.
*Drinking alcohol, smoking and drug use are understood to be three of the main contributory factors to Cot Death. In simple terms, if you value the health of your infant, keep away from destructive drugs like these!
*Poor parental care. First-time or young parents are the greatest risk. However, as long as a parent ensures they get early and frequent parental care checks and also have the backing of their friends and family, the risk of this happening is significantly reduced.
*Babies born prematurely are at an increased Dangers of SIDS.
Premature babies at birth have a disadvantage initially with and can often be quite fragile and under developed. This is again more a note than a specific prevention.
*Mothers who are under the age of 20 are at Dangers of having a child die from Cot Death. This can be for a cross-section of reasons such as simple inexperience or accidental neglect.
By using the tips above and ensuring that you are aware of the potential risks and also implementing the precautions for baby sleep safety you can lower the likelihood of losing a infant to SIDS. For parents who have lost a infant to Cot Death there are numerous excellent support groups available to assist in going through the process of grieving.
Chris is the webmaster of www.infantsleep.info which gives a wealth of information, help and advice on infant sleep problems.
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Source: http://www.articlealley.com/article_79279_40.html
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