Researchers Find Clue to SIDS Early Detection 197
SpaceAdmiral writes "The Globe and Mail is reporting that scientists have found babies who die from Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) tend to have an abnormality in their brain stem. By linking SIDS to a biological cause, it may now be possible to test for the abnormality and treat babies at risk of SIDS."
A promising theory (Score:2)
Mrs. Otter gave birth to our first pup a little over a year ago, and I noticed even then that many of the strategies we were given to reduce the chances of SIDS (baby on their back, in their own bed, no blankets, no "crib-bumpers") really seemed to be about reducing the risk of suffocation.
I'm no scientist, but hearing a theory that some babies might be a little worse of when required to react to lack of oxygen tracks pretty well with what the prevention techniques.
Sounds promising - time for a bigger stu
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Suffocation itself isn't hard to detect. It CAN be hard to tell why it happened... did baby get wrapped up in his blanket? Did Mom flip out? Did he stop breathing because of a brain disorder?
The second S in SIDS stands for syndrome... so technically any baby that dies suddenly for no apparent cause is a victim of SIDS. It is known though that some babies just seem to stop breathing. People have witnesse
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I guess my wife and I weighed up the risks associated with the babies sleeping on their tummies vs nobody (mum, dad, and kids) getting any sleep, and decided the former was the better option. (In fact, at 3am in the morning almost anything seems like a better option!)
I'm not sure how it compares to SIDS, but driving a car when you haven't slep
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If you look at the statistics, the "in their own bed" recommendation only applies if the parent is drunk or drugged out.
...or is a heavy sleeper, has thick blankets, suffers from sleep apnea, or, or, or...
Look; I have no problems if mom and dad want to keep the little one in their bed. Different people, different cultures have different ideas and I'm all for that. I've never heard any credible suggestion about aural therapy to teach kids breathing techniques before - but maybe there's something to it.
Re:A promising theory (Score:4, Informative)
Dr. James McKenna is the leading researcher on this issue. Here's [naturalchild.org] an article that discusses his findings on the effects of parental proximity on infant sleep breathing. (For more info about him and his work in general, check out this [nd.edu] page.)
Also, I don't think it's mentioned in that article, but most of the recommendations against co-sleeping as SIDS prevention stem from one big New Zealand study (the kiwis have traditionally kept the best statistics on SIDS, so a lot of info comes from their data). That study initially found a statistically significant correlation between co-sleeping and SIDS deaths. However, later re-examination of the data found that, when controlling for maternal smoking (a factor that has been linked to SIDS by several studies), the correlation between co-sleeping and SIDS disappeared. New Zealand has a fairly large Maori population, which both is more likely to smoke and is more likely to co-sleep, and that caused the cross-correlation.
So yes, unless parents have particular health issues which make it unsafe (such as alcohol or drug use, extreme obesity, or certain sleep disorders) co-sleeping is safer than crib-sleeping. Dr. McKenna has found that the beneficial effects of sleeping near Mom extend even to kids in a crib in the same room as their parents, too, so for those with problems that prevent bed-sharing, modified co-sleeping is another way to keep baby safe. The cultural notion that sleep is an intensely private activity that should only be shared with your spouse does interfere with the safety of young children (and not just with SIDS; I remember hearing a story about a two-year-old who woke up in the middle of the night, decided to climb up her dresser, and was found dead in the morning after it toppled onto her... I can't imagine that happening to my two-year-old, since he still sleeps next to us!).
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There have been monkey experiments which back this up.
Or... (Score:2, Insightful)
They will find out that there are a notable amount of SIDS deaths that are marked as SIDS because doctors didn't want to make the parents feel any worse for putting the kid in a water bed, or with inappropriate bedding... or not sleeping with their kid the first 3 months to help regulate their breathing, or being too far away to have heard the baby cough up some sour milk and drown themselves...
SIDS is a horrible thing... but quite a few deaths that were actually the fault of the parent for not researching
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Which is why it's important to check your sources.
I had to google Gina Ford to find out who she is. It appears she is a maternity nurse
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The American Academy of Pediatrics and researchers who study infant deaths say bed sharing leaves babies vulnerable to being crushed or suffocated and may increase their risk for sudden infant death syndrome, especially if the mother is a smoker. ...
In advising against bed sharing, the policy statement pointed to numerous studies supporting its case, including one showing that nearly half of 119 infants who died suddenly and unexpectedly during a four-year period in the St. Lou
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So far their is precious little evidence as to what causes sids. Since the research reports so little that we can actually say causes SIDS, how can you POSSIBLY say it's the parent's fault?
Raising a baby is difficult and tiring. As a light sleeper, it become absolutely necessary to move our son out to his own room. Granted, we do have a baby monitor set up, and I placed
SIDS and sleeping on the stomach (Score:2)
Well, from one parent to another, let me say this... it's not a "SLIGHT CORRELATION", it's a statistical fact [nih.gov] that the rate of SIDS has dropped by 50% since the inception of the Back To Sleep campaign.
You can spin it however you want, but an awful lot of babies were smot
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I have 4 kids, each of whom slept with us until they were about 2. In fact, occasionally the littler ones still join us at night. Our kids are bright, independent and creative, and the idea that someone not impaired with drugs or alcohol or with a serious sleep con
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Then there's this other little problem. Three month old babies are supposed to sleep 16 or 17 hours a day. How did you solve that? Did you take turns sleeping with them or did you convince yourself that sleeping only 8 hours a day was fine for your baby? (note: it isn't)
X. (BTW I got a fat lip once wh
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It's a bother that my daughter will come in our room, but it only happens maybe once a week or less, and she usually just curls up at the bottom of the
As a new parent, I think this is interesting (Score:2)
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Awesome! More tests for Babies!!! (Score:3, Insightful)
Frequently, these tests are for things that can't be cured, or that have experimental cures that are sanctioned by the American Societies of Obstetrics/Pediatricians, but the treatment success rate isn't known, nor are the potential harms of a lot of the "cures."
I'm not belittling the science here, nor am I saying that this isn't a good thing, I'm just pointing out a human cost here -- the stress levels for tests and procedures during these stages of development are very high, and it is an extremely rare doctor who will/can admit that their procedures are experimental.
If you're pregnant or have a small child, do some research on the tests you'll be given. You'll be amazed at what you discover.
Be carefull (Score:2)
I did an astounding amount of research after my first child was born. Someone without an knowledge of science can easily be lied to.
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When I had my first son, the test results came back "Positive" for Downs Syndrome. When I asked; "what are the chances?" The answer was; 1 in 300. How could we verify this? Amniosentisis (sorry about spelling) -- which is to sample the amniotic fluid in the spine of the baby. The risks were 1 in 244 (about) for killing the fetus.
We went with a detailed ultrasound, and the chances dropped to 1 in 150.
With about 300 different diseases tested in babies, I could see that to guarantee NO disea
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If the risk went from 1 in 300 to 1 in 150, the risk went up, not down.
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Of course-- your right. I meant to say it the other way. The ultrasound showing the baby's form being within norms reduced the chance of Downs Syndrome by half, from 1 in 150 to 1 in 300.
My point is that the amniocentesis test has about a 1 in 250 chance of causing severe damage to the baby.
So, we have tests that go to nervous mothers, and the results are less accurate than the chance of damage by further testing. Amniocentesis is the ma
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Would we accept a routine game that put a gun to our head and gave us a 1 in 200 chance of putting a bullet in our brain? No. But we ask that of pregnant mothers. The tests are NOT accurate -- there are false positives and then you get risk factors like "1 in 244" -- how useful is that? To me, it seems that there are some very useful tests, and then others that may be driven by labs wanting to charge for tests.
My wife had a miscarriage
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I knew that if I had exact numbers, I would worry unnecessarily and look up diseases online. It turned out that I had gestational diabetes, so the testing there was worthwhile, and I did get exa
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This is a standard statistical thing, when testing for anything rare. Doctors ought to hand out pamphlets on this when discussing any of these kinds oftest results. Consider this contrived example:
You have a condition whose incidence in the population in 1 in 1 million (i.e. if you pick a person at random, there's a 1 in 1 million chance they have this condition). You test for it with a test that's 99.9% accurate. This means that 1 out of every 1000 tests gives a wrong indication.
Suppose you run this t
Not a lot of parents on slashdot (Score:2, Insightful)
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Treatment? (Score:2, Interesting)
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Crikey.
I think mechanical asphyxia (face down death) or some kind of error in the nerve structures controlling breathing are far, far, far, far, far more likely.
Justin.
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There's plenty of evidence to support this.
Where?
What /. Really Needs (Score:2)
Evolution and modern medicine (Score:2)
If this condition has a genetic cause (not saying it does or doesn't, mind you) . . . then don't we make our species weaker by treating it and allowing those kids who would have died to grow up and reproduce?
Sure, in this one case it might only be a few thousand kids a year, but add up all the diseases and conditions that have genetic links that we are treating successfully with modern medicine . . . while the short-term gain of having a lar
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Natural selection favors traits that allow a species to survive in its environment, not in some other environment, such as the one its forbears inhabited.
So, for example, our forefathers were genetically predisposed to not be allergic to peanuts. That was simply not a trait a specimen could express and survive. Nowadays, with effective diagnosis and cortizone shots and "May contain nuts" labels all over the place, it's something you c
History? (Score:2)
When I was growing up, the thinking about SIDS was that while the phenomenon existed, a good number of SIDS cases were actually murders of children by parents (if I recall, mothers were primarily blamed) using SIDS as the alibi.
Was that crap? Do we know? What's the thinking now? (Not what causes it, but whether the number of cases of SIDS is actually the number of ACTUAL c
"treat", yes that's it. (Score:2)
I think we know where this will probably lead.
Anyone have the stomach to research the Down Syndrome test?
will it help? (Score:2)
And how do they intend to 'treat' these babies? pacemaker
look to other countries for "treatment" (Score:2)
Ryan's mom (Score:2)
The truth [timecube.com] is that these kids are just too lazy and undisciplined to do what's best for them (that is, to continue breathing). That's what happens when you don't beat your kids [thebestpag...iverse.net].
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Yeah, if the parents of the babies that die from SIDS can laugh about it, why can't the scientists?
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Tribute.wmv was funny, 9/11 wasn't, see the critical difference?
Lesson #206
Tribute.wmv was not funny to those who lost a loved one in 9/11.
Lesson #207
Tribute.wmv is still funny.
Insert SIDS as necessary.
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Bastard.
also, I never found Sid Ceaser to be funny.
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What's paradoxical about it ? A wolf is a lot tougher than a poodle.
That said, rich and poor are not separate breeding populations, so they aren't going to speciate even partially.
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I don't think we can deny these people having children, it's more of a personal responsibility thing. It's wh
Not getting the point... (Score:3, Insightful)
For example, picture the population genetic diversity represented as a bell curve, with the 'optimum' being the modal value. This curve comes about from a whole set of selection pressures, which in an abstract way in this example maps in the aggregate toward that modal value being allowed to survive.
If your
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Wait, are there children reading this ?
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if it is a question of age then no.. if it is a question of level of bain funcion then well, you might wnat to keep it to your self
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Moreover, intelligence is unpredictable and can show up in a child from a very unfortunate background. I know a "trailor-trash" kid who did not know the alphabet until he was 15 (not a typo!), yet he got his PhD+MD by 29.
This is precisely why every trailor-trash/ghetto we
Look at it from the gene's point of view (Score:2)
You're looking at it the wrong way round. You're seeing the species as important. It isn't. What's important
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Cancer is hardly 100% faulty genes. Not that I necessarily agree with the original point, but...bad analogy.
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Basically, I don't like the notion that "nature" somehow knows what's best for us, and that we shouldn't try to "mess with the balance". It's a complete non sequitur anyway: babies will die if we don't help them
Nope... (Score:5, Insightful)
Really, if you want to have the heartiest gene pool with respect to the whole natural selection scheme of things, you keep everyone alive you can within reason, even if no apparent benefit can be objectively realized for their apparent defect. The whole deal is that when the environment changes, bizarre things can happen and the more genetic diversity your population has, the more able it is to survive radical changes.
An example is sickle-cell anemia, most common people with an incomplete grasp of natural selection would think 'that sucks, let nature eliminate that gene from the pool!'. However in the incomplete dominance model it happens to behave, a person heterozygous for sickle cell anemia happens to be much more resistant to malaria.
In the case of this article, let's assume some neurological pathogen suddenly becomes ubiquitous to the human environment, and somehow the brain stem 'defect' shields those with the trait. Assume this preliminary research is correct and leads to a cure for SIDS, for the sake of discussion. You have a hearty population with a now harmless defect that would be the only survivors. If SIDS wipes out that 'defect' and such a weird pathogen came, the species goes extinct.
To be trekkie for a moment, a good demonstration is when the TNG crew came upon a planet that eliminated all defective conceptions to not deal with the associated problems. However, their planet was saved from obliteration based on technology in Geordi's visor, which never would have come about in a society where they avoided having to make such a device. The principle is interesting fodder for science fiction, and that I think illustrates well the pitfall of 'let only the best go on'. Best is always relative to the current status quo, which is never unchangeable.
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Not necessarily... (Score:2)
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The situation changes a bit if a given mutation somehow spreads preferentiall
Eeeew. (Score:2)
Again missing the point... (Score:2)
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Aw crap. I'm still bitter about being turned down as a writer for TNG. . .
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Human beings have a very small gene base.
We all were created from the small base of around 10,000 people (i guess), who survived the Toba volcano eruption.
Such being the case, it is very important for us to have the biggest gene variation as possible, lest some really bad happens to us (say a really bad virus or something).
In my view, it is very important to keep all the gene variations alive rather than killing off the the unsavory ones.
I woul
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A bit like the people who think the earth is overpopulated, but haven't arranged a mass suicide for themselves.
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I think that "abnormality in the brain stem" is itself due to the parentus getting maddus at the kiddus and giving him a slappus for which they don't want to take the responsibilitus.
Man, a direct-from-the-ass theory that even manages to magle the Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum sonatur approach.
I suppose it'll get modified insightful - a much stronger indication that someone was beaten on the head while a child.
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More likely shaking.
Slap or any other single impacts tend to injure the cortex on the slap side and the opposite (countershock) side. They do not damage the stem.
On the other hand shaking definitely damages the stem. So the picture is more along the lines of "parentus getting maddus at the kiddus and shaking him for which they don't want to take the responsibilitus"
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Let's try to stick to proper terminology here.
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I work in emergency medicine (have for many years), and am currently working on my Phd in pharmacy. I have seen first hand infants who have died, and the death attributed to SIDS. I am going to dispel the misconceptions here & now about your comment on "shaking" and other similar accusations.
Shaking or slapping a child causing injury to the brain leaves signs & is easily recognizable. Battle's signs (bruising behind the ears) are prevalent in such a case of abuse, even post mortem. Abuse is easy
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Just removing the hearsay would be a good thing.
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Actually, parents were told to lay kids on their stomachs because they sleep more soundly that way. The vomiting/aspiration thing sounds all doctorly, though, so they pi
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Well, the kid might wander out into the street and get hit by a bus when he's 5. Might as well snuff him before then so that can't happen.
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The two
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I'm not getting your point. Wouldn't you want to know as soon as possible if there was a problem? You seem to be implying that being asked about termination is a horrible thing, but I can't tell.
(For the record, I would terminate a pregnancy if a test revealed a serious problem. Life sucks enough already without being given an unfair deal from day one, and every child deserves to be a healthy child.)
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None that they know of anyway...
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Oblig Dr Katz (Score:2)
You think you may have Sudden Infant Death Syndrome? I don't think you can have that
Well I think mine may be going more gradually. I think I may have GRIDS.
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A large proportion of people put their babies to sleep on their backs. If skull deformity were assured there'd a large proportion of the population with skull deformity.
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Well I agree with you that it's bizarre for people to insist on such testing in a situation where it could serve you no possible benefit and I'm glad you stuck to your guns. But obviously some people do have their interests served by such testing.
Haven't the parents heard of "tummy time"? I have a flat area on my h
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There are three reasons (off the top of my head) that one might want to know beforehand:
1. Termination. You might not terminate a Down's-positive fetus, but some people do, especially if it looks like they're going to die anyway.
2. Treatment. I have heard that some heart defects (which is one of the largest death-related dang
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http://www.cotlife2000.co.nz/wrap.htm [cotlife2000.co.nz]
But there seems to be a press release that Wikipedia mentions that disputes it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sudden_infant_death_s yndrome#Speculated_associations [wikipedia.org]
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Sudden_infant_d