This article is from the WebMD Medical News Archive

Oct. 10, 2005 -- Babies should be put to sleep on their backs and offered a pacifier, and they should not sleep overnight in the same bed with their parents, according to surprising new guidelines designed to prevent sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS).

The American Academy of Pediatrics defines SIDS as the sudden death of a baby under 1 year of age for which no cause can be determined after thorough clinical investigation including an autopsy.

The updated recommendations were released Monday by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP).

While the AAP SIDS panel came out strongly against bed sharing, it concluded that room sharing -- placing the infant's crib or bassinet in the caregivers' bedroom at night -- reduces the risk of sudden infant death during sleep.

The panel also came out for the first time against side sleeping, concluding that the risk that the sleeping infant will roll over onto his or her stomach is too great.

Dramatic Reduction in SIDS Deaths

It has been a little over a decade since AAP first told parents to place sleeping infants on their backs to protect them against SIDS. Since then, the number of unexplained sudden infant deaths in the United States has dropped by half, from around 5,000 cases a year during the early 1990s to less than 2,500 last year.

The experts now say that increased use of pacifiers at naptimes and bedtime could have a similarly dramatic impact on SIDS deaths.

"The studies have consistently shown that risk declines with pacifier use," says SIDS researcher and panel member Rachel Moon, MD, who is pediatric medical director at Washington's Children's National Medical Center. "We don't really know why. But the evidence was too compelling to ignore."

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