SIDS breakthrough

[Anonymous]

Hopefully a huge breakthrough in understanding the mechanism behind SIDS. This could bring some type of closure for so many families despite this worst imaginable tragedy. It has been tied to an enzyme deficiency. Juts wanted to share.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352396422002225

"For years, scientists have believed that SIDS — the sudden death of an infant during sleep in its first year — is tied to a malfunction that causes some babies not to startle or wake if they stop breathing while sleeping. But until now, no one knew exactly what was causing that malfunction. This study has pinpointed that the enzyme butyrylcholinesterase (BChE) — an enzyme vital to the brain’s arousal pathway — is significantly lower in babies who died of SIDS."

[Anonymous]

Wow. Yay science, but that's still sad.

[Anonymous]

Wow that's exciting! I hope this leads to theputics.

[Anonymous]

I'm glad they found something. I hope this gives those families who lost babies a little relief. I think the general public had regarded SIDS as fake and blamed the parents for bad sleeping arrangements or whatnot.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm glad they found something. I hope this gives those families who lost babies a little relief. I think the general public had regarded SIDS as fake and blamed the parents for bad sleeping arrangements or whatnot.

I get that, but isn't there also a risk of accidental suffocation separate from SIDS? Like, bad sleeping arrangements are still a risk.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm glad they found something. I hope this gives those families who lost babies a little relief. I think the general public had regarded SIDS as fake and blamed the parents for bad sleeping arrangements or whatnot.

I get that, but isn't there also a risk of accidental suffocation separate from SIDS? Like, bad sleeping arrangements are still a risk.

Certainly sleeping arrangements can increase risk but good arrangements don’t eliminate it. I believe the thought is many infants without this relative deficit would rouse in that situation and SIDS babies unfortunately don’t.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm glad they found something. I hope this gives those families who lost babies a little relief. I think the general public had regarded SIDS as fake and blamed the parents for bad sleeping arrangements or whatnot.

Part of that was the fault of coroners that would flag an obvious suffocation death as SIDS so as to not further traumatize the parents. Their hearts may have been in the right place, but it did not help the cause.

I wonder if that still means the associations they previously found were right (eg parental smoking) what the linkage might be.

[Anonymous]

It's interesting. I talked to an MD once (when my baby was little and I was worried about SIDS) who said, basically, that SIDS didn't really exist and was a way of letting parents who accidentally smothered their baby off the hook. I didn't quite believe him but I wondered how prevalent that view was.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's interesting. I talked to an MD once (when my baby was little and I was worried about SIDS) who said, basically, that SIDS didn't really exist and was a way of letting parents who accidentally smothered their baby off the hook. I didn't quite believe him but I wondered how prevalent that view was.

Wow. What an incredibly offensive and unprofessional thing to say.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's interesting. I talked to an MD once (when my baby was little and I was worried about SIDS) who said, basically, that SIDS didn't really exist and was a way of letting parents who accidentally smothered their baby off the hook. I didn't quite believe him but I wondered how prevalent that view was.

Wow. What an incredibly offensive and unprofessional thing to say.

Yep and would make me question everything about their interpretation of data and how their personal bias inserts into their medical advice

[Anonymous]

I wonder if SUDEP results from the same (Sudden death in epilepsy- what the young man from Disney descendents died from).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I wonder if SUDEP results from the same (Sudden death in epilepsy- what the young man from Disney descendents died from).

Did he have uncontrolled seizures?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I wonder if SUDEP results from the same (Sudden death in epilepsy- what the young man from Disney descendents died from).

Did he have uncontrolled seizures?

SUDEP is most common in people who have seizures in their sleep.

[Anonymous]

Great! Maybe we can let babies sleep on their tummies again, where they belong.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Great! Maybe we can let babies sleep on their tummies again, where they belong.

Amen. It’s why parents aren’t getting any sleep! Can you imagine being strapped down on your back and put in bed? It’s mean.