Teaching Safe Sleep Practices

"A tragic sleep accident could happen to any family, so do everything possible to prevent one." - Tom Krzmarzick, MD, medical direction, Soin Pediatric Trauma and Emergency Center.

Dayton Children's is one of the community partners serving on Montgomery County's Child Fatality Review Board (CFRB). The purpose of the board is to fully understand how and why children die in Montgomery County in an effort to protect other children.

Since 1997, the CFRB discovered that Montgomery County had lost over 100 of their newest residents because of infant sleep-related deaths. This is an average of one infant every 4-5 weeks. In most cases, this devastating event could have been prevented by providing children with the proper sleep environment.

To address this challenge, the CRFB formed a safe sleep subcommittee including members from Dayton Children's.

In 2007, the ABCs of Safe Sleep Campaign was born in Montgomery County. That campaign provided one-piece snap shirts, and magnets to parents of newborns in the county. Hospitals used those items and the ABCs of Safe Sleep brochure as teaching tools to encourage parents and all caregivers to follow the ABCs of safe sleep: Babies should sleep Alone (A), on their Back (B), in a Crib (C). Follow-up surveys with pregnant and parenting families indicate an increase in knowledge about safe sleep, however, there is still work to be done to change practice. The committee continues to investigate ways to reach the goal -- reducing the number of these preventable infant deaths.

For more information about safe sleep practices, please contact the Family Resource Center at 937-641-3700, and for more information on our pediatric sleep center, contact us at 937-641-5004.