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May 2001
BREATHING MONITORS DON'T
PREDICT COT DEATH
Electronic monitors that keep track of infants breathing and heart rate when sleeping are not beneficial for detecting a risk of cot death, researchers have found.
The publication of the study coincides with this year's National Cot Death Awareness Week, which kicks off today.
The research, conducted in the US, appears in the current issue of the
Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). Electronic monitors were used to measure the breathing patterns and heart rates of 1,079 sleeping babies during their first six months and a total of 718,358 hours of recordings were made.
Some of the babies were considered to be healthy, whilst others - such as premature infants and those whose siblings had previously died of cot death - were classified as being potentially at risk. The recordings showed that disrupted breathing and slow heart rates occurred regularly, even in healthy babies, and that the pattern happened before the age previously thought to be linked to cot death.
One of the researchers, Dr George Lister, says, "The results suggest that these events are not immediate precursors to SIDS, as was previously thought."
Commenting on the findings, a spokesperson for the Foundation for the Study of Infant Deaths (FSID) said, "We have long held the belief that breathing monitors do not prevent cot death. Babies can and do die whilst the monitors are being used. However, they can be useful for parents, as they help reduce their worry and anxiety."
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