Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) continues to be the third leading cause of infant death, according to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), despite a decline in SIDS that is associated with a rise in safe-sleep practices for newborns and infants. A new study by Barbara M. Ostfeld, PhD and Thomas Hegyi, MD, professors in the Department of Pediatrics at UMDNJ-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, has identified that more than 96 percent of infants who died of SIDS were exposed to known risk factors, among them sleeping on their side or stomach, or exposure to tobacco smoke, and that 78 percent of SIDS cases contained multiple risk factors. The study, "Concurrent Risks in Sudden Infant Death Syndrome," was published online today by Pediatrics and will appear in the journal's March print issue. The study provides evidence that despite a decline in SIDS, a continuing effort should be made by health care providers to educate parents and other caregivers and to do so with attention to all identified risk factors, as recommended by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP).
In 2005, according to the CDC, 2,234 infants died of SIDS in the United States. Forty-four of those deaths occurred in New Jersey. The study notes that the incidence of SIDS has declined by more than 50 percent since the onset of public health initiatives during the 1990s, most notably the AAP's "Back-to-Sleep" campaign, to raise awareness of infant care practices that elevate the risk of SIDS. However, the study indicates that risk-reduction education needs to be more comprehensive.
"It is important that health care providers communicate all of the risk factors of SIDS ideally during the prenatal period as well as at birth and throughout the first year of an infant's life," said Dr. Ostfeld, who also is program director of the SIDS Center of New Jersey.