Anti-Swaddling Advice Could Trigger Illness or Have Deadly Consequences

Newborn care experts are calling arms-free swaddling and anti-swaddling advice misleading and irresponsible at best, and potentially harmful or even deadly at worst.  The messages are patently false, lacking evidence, data and clinical studies while going directly against decades of clinical research*.

“To advise parents to use an arms-free swaddle or no swaddle at all based on unsubstantiated fears is downright absurd,” says Raleigh, North Carolina-based Pamela Diamond, a certified postpartum doula and baby sleep consultant.  “Without this vital tool that is clinically proven to comfort a crying, screaming newborn and keep an infant safely asleep on its back, parents could possibly be setting up a trigger for illness or even deadly consequences.”

Apparently Dr. Harvey Karp concurs. An eminent expert on the subject of newborn sleep and whose work spans nearly four decades, Dr. Karp has long advocated swaddling as part of the Five S’s.   On his website The Happiest Baby on the Block, Karp writes that swaddling is essential to public health because infant crying and the exhaustion it causes in parents are main triggers for postpartum depression, SIDS, child abuse such as Shaken Baby Syndrome, breastfeeding failure, maternal smoking, marital stress, car accidents, and over-diagnosis and treatment of babies for illness, among others.

Though some published reports claim otherwise, the American Academy of Pediatrics has advocated swaddling many times and has also written about the benefits of swaddling on numerous occasions.

Nowhere is the anti-swaddling trend more directly evident than in North Carolina.  As part of the implementation of the Infant Safe Sleep Campaign the NC Healthy Start Foundation says the long held tradition of swaddling could lead to suffocation due to loose bedding.  While loose bedding is no doubt a serious problem, it is altogether a separate issue from swaddling safety.

“Considering the millions of people that have been swaddling newborns every night and every day, if such a theory were correct, there would be literally thousands of such reported incidents over the years, and there simply aren’t,” says Michael Gatten, CEO and Founder of Miracle Industries, LLC, makers of a leading swaddling product, Miracle Blanket. “We are extremely concerned about parents being incorrectly educated regarding sleep positions that have not been clinically studied.”

As an example of the misinformation, the term “swaddling” is being exploited and illegitimately applied to various non-swaddling items to validate the use of clinical studies to promote sales. While most of these products do serve the purpose of eliminating loose bedding, they lack the very discernible scientifically-proven attributes that make swaddling safe and effective.

Arms-free swaddling or no swaddle at all, it’s pretty much the same.  In both cases, experts say the efficacy and the benefits are gone.  Therefore it’s crucial to separate the MYTHS from the FACTS.

MYTH: A wearable blanket or other zip-up sack is just as good as a swaddling blanket to help babies sleep.

FACT: Medical research showing the incredible efficacy of PROPER swaddling has been done using a snugly-wrapped blanket with arms comfortably immobilized; usually at the sides. Wearable blankets are not snug to apply pressure and do not keep the arms snugly inside.

MYTH: Babies need their hands free to self-soothe, develop motor skills, and to flail their arms if they are in distress.

FACT: Babies are not coordinated enough to practice motor skills and/or self-soothe (ie. suck hands) reliably until 14 weeks.  Swaddling is a substitute during this time to limit startle reflex, thus preventing unwanted arousal and facial scratches.

MYTH: Wearable blankets and other zip-up sacks help babies sleep better.

FACT: Only PROPER swaddling has been shown in clinical studies to calm a fussy, colicky baby while helping baby sleep safer, better, deeper and longer on their backs, while also eliminating loose bedding.

MYTH: Wearable blankets and other zip-up sacks contribute to a decrease in the risk of SIDS.

FACT: Only PROPER swaddling has been shown in clinical studies* to reduce SIDS by as much as 30% even over back-sleeping babies without swaddling.

MYTH: Tight swaddling can interfere with lung expansion, contributing to the risk of suffocation.

FACT: Research on PROPER swaddling has shown that a tight swaddle does not inhibit oxygen absorption or respiration. And, no incident of suffocation due to overly tight swaddling has ever been reported.

#  #  #

*Ponsonby, A, et al, Factors potentiating the risk of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome associated with the Prone Position. NEJM 1993; 329:377-82 http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/329/6/377

Contact: Susan Calloway

ON CUE MEDIA

(214) 675-0539

Susan@OnCueMedia.com

OTHER RESOURCES & CONTACTS: www.SwaddlingTruth.com

We really do know this but do we?  It is very important that babies have a down time, a time to drift into a deep REM sleep that will allow them to take in what they have learned.  Many parents are very well meaning to provide stimulation (i.e., toys, talking, reading) but Science Daily this week shares that there is evidence that baby’s nap times are necessary.

Are you not sure how to get your baby to sleep for naps?  Only getting catnaps and rough nights?  Don’t be discouraged; I can help you.  http://www.babiease.com/contact.htm

Read more from Science Daily: Naps help babies learn and retain new information.

Photo courtesy of Elle Photography

Another study is out: Infants who died of SIDS had low levels of serotonin, a brain chemical that helps the brainstem regulate breathing, temperature, sleeping, waking and other automatic functions.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2010-02-03-sids03_st_N.htm

So what can we parents and caregivers do?  As a reminder:

• Put baby to sleep on back.
• Place baby on a firm surface such as a safety-approved crib mattress.
• Keep soft objects such as toys and loose bedding out of the crib.
• Don’t smoke around the baby, whether in home or car.
• Don’t let baby get overheated; dress in light sleep clothing and consider circulating air with a fan in the room.
• Keep the baby close to you, but in a separate bed.
• Consider giving the baby a pacifier.
  .

Sources: CDC, National Institute of Child Health and Human Development

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/checkup/2008/10/sids_and_fan_use_for_weds_oct.html

There is nothing so immeasurably sad as the death of an infant. And when that death is attributed to SIDS – sudden infant death syndrome — the sadness is amplified by confusion and maddening uncertainty. For while doctors have given this syndrome a name for decades, and while it is listed as the leading cause of death among infants between one month and one year old, it’s still just a “diagnosis of exclusion” — the medical community can’t fully explain why it happens and can only offer educated guesses as to how parents might protect their children.

This week brought another potential factor to parents’ attention. A studyconducted by the Kaiser Permanente Division of Research and published Monday in the October issue of the Archives of Pediatric & Adolescent Medicine, found that infants sleeping in a room where air was ventilated with a fan had a 72 percent lower risk of SIDS than babies who slept without fans. The idea is that a fan circulates fresh air and lessens the extent to which the baby re-inhales its own exhaled breath…

Meredith F. Small is an anthropologist at Cornell University and is also the author of "Our Babies, Ourselves; How Biology and Culture Shape the Way We Parent" just came out with a new article, Should Babies be put on a Schedule.  Check it out. 

The clearly study shows the benefit of a schedule is a well rested happy mother but yet she rebels to say that baby "neurologically unfinished" and need to be on top of Mom.  If the babies are "neurologically unfinished" as she says they need direction!  Oh, Ms. Small, direction of a schedule meets Mom and babies needs!

Babies can recongnize their mother’s sent.  Researcher, Natalie Goubet, Ph.D., a developement phsychologist at Gettysburg college in Pennsylvania, studied of a group of babies.  The babies were exposed to 18 hours of the vanilla sent before their PKU screening; the babies smelled the vanilla during and after were calmed down faster than those who weren’t exposed to the vanilla sent.