Last year, 3,700 infants died from sleep-relatedfactors, and in Georgia alone, three babies die each week from such complications, according to Dr. Terri McFadden, a Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta primary care physician and injury prevention expert. Children’s Hughes Spalding campus is working to combat this, launching an awareness campaign targeting those most at risk.
With support from a recent grant, Children’s launched the Safe Sleep Campaign, an advertising and resource-driven initiative promoting awareness among vulnerable populations.
“We’re very thankful that the donor recognized that this is a really significant health inequity when it comes to our babies,” McFadden said about the campaign, calling it “a great way to use our platform.”
As a primary care physician with nearly four decades of experience treating and educating urban communities experiencing health inequities in areas such as sleep related deaths, McFadden can discuss not only clinically backed tips for safe sleep, but also personal and professional insight into the importance of this initiative.
The campaign will feature billboards across metro Atlanta advertising the rules of safe sleep and digital ads sharing the story of a family who lost their infant son, Khyree, to sudden infant death syndrome. Children’s will also be distributing 800 “Safe Sleep Bundles” for families at Hughes Spalding that will include a sleep sack, which can be a safer alternative to blankets, and handouts with safe sleep tips and education.
The campaign also will give additional resources for Hughes Spalding’s emergency department and staff to better educate parents on the best practices when taking home their newborn.
Safe sleep habits are an issue Children’s focuses on because of the “huge health equity component” often present often in these tragic situations.
“Sleep-related injury deaths are the leading cause of injury deaths for babies, and we know that Black babies and American Indian or Native Alaskan babies are at almost twice the risk of having a sleep related death as white babies,” McFadden, who has spent almost 40 years treating and educating communities with health inequalities, told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
According to McFadden, children in urban communities are a high-risk population for these deaths, as well as families who may not have enough access to resources or health care, which is where “miseducation can happen.”
Most common mistakes
McFadden said the most common mistakes often happen because of exhaustion, when parents are “trying desperately to have their children have some quality sleep.” Infants are at the highest risk for sleep-related deaths when they are under 6 months old.
She specifically called out products that are advertised to help babies fall asleep but actually make them less safe. Instead, she said parents should focus on the ABCs of safe sleep.
Babies must sleep alone with no bed sharing, on their back, in a crib with no blankets or stuffed animals.
What can parents do?
Doctors do not know the exact causes of SIDS and other sleep-related deaths, but there is information parents can use to keep their kids safe.
According to McFadden, using pacifiers to sleep can help prevent these tragedies.
“The reason is unclear,” according to National Children’s Hospital. “It may be because babies don’t sleep as deeply when they have a pacifier, which helps wake them up if they’re having trouble breathing. A pacifier also keeps the tongue forward in the mouth, so it can’t block the airway.”
Parents also should abstain from smoking or allowing the baby to be exposed to any harmful substances, like drugs, before or after birth, McFadden said.
McFadden also stressed the importance of making sure your baby is fully immunized, so so they don’t contract preventable illnesses that put them at risk.
Many families do not practice safe sleep because they believe deaths from sleep-related injuries are too rare to affect them, thinking “it can’t happen to us” or “it can’t happen to our baby,” McFadden said.
McFadden said parents should still make sure to take all the precautions possible, because, “When you know better, you do better.”
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