ArticleBMJ open2023
Changes in background characteristics and risk factors among SIDS infants in England: cohort comparisons from 1993 to 2020.
Article in BMJ open, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 10 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
10 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 11 citations in OpenAlex.
- Prenatal and postnatal factors associated with sudden infant death syndrome: an umbrella review of meta-analyses.World journal of pediatrics : WJP · 2024Pooled it
- Review
- Caregiver lived experiences attempting to follow safe sleep recommendations to sleep their baby in a cot: a qualitative directed content analysis.Primary health care research & development · 2026Article
- "Okay in theory": a qualitative study of safer sleep advice in families with infants at risk and families reporting risky sleep practices.BMJ paediatrics open · 2025Article
- Baby Sleep Project Protocol: a realist evaluation of an intervention to reduce preventable infant mortality.BMJ open · 2025Article
- The vicious spiral in Sudden Infant Death Syndrome.Frontiers in pediatrics · 2025Review
- Global, regional, and national burden of sudden infant death syndrome and the impact of COVID-19: a trend and health inequality analysis based on the global burden of disease study 2021.Frontiers in pediatrics · 2025Article
- Beyond the rules: an integrative review of parental perspectives on safer infant sleep in shared environments.Frontiers in public health · 2025Review
- The French registry of sudden unexpected death in infancy (SUDI): a 7-year review of available data.European journal of pediatrics · 2024Article
- Infant death from accidental suffocation and strangulation in bed in England and Wales: rare or unrecognised events?BMJ paediatrics open · 2024Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
11 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectivesUsing the National Child Mortality Database, this work aims to investigate background characteristics and risk factors in the sleeping environment associated with sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) and compare the prevalence with previous English SIDS case-control studies.
designCohort of SIDS in 2020 compared with a combined analysis of two case-control studies conducted in 1993-1996 and 2003-2006.
settingEngland, UK
participants138 SIDS deaths in 2020 compared with 402 SIDS deaths and 1387 age-equivalent surviving controls, combined from previous studies.
resultsThe increased vulnerability of SIDS infants identified in previous studies has become more marked. The infants who died in 2020 were younger (median=66 days (IQR: 34-118) vs 86 days (IQR: 52-148), p=0.003) with an increased prevalence of low birth weight (30.5% vs 21.6%, p=0.04) and preterm births (29.6% vs 19.3%, p=0.012). The excess of socioeconomically deprived families, male infants and high levels of maternal smoking during pregnancy were still evident. Among recent deaths, fewer infants were put down or found on their side; however, there was no significant change in the proportion of infants who were put down (15.6% vs 14.6%, p=0.81) and found prone (40.4% vs 35.3%, p=0.37), despite population wide risk reduction advice over three decades. The proportional increase observed in 2003-2006 of half the deaths occurring while sleeping next to an adult was maintained in 2020, and for the vast majority (90%), this was in hazardous circumstances (adult had consumed alcohol, smoked, slept on a sofa, or the infant was premature or low birth weight and less than 3 months old). More deaths also occurred when there was a disruption in infant care routine compared with previous observations (52.6% vs 20.7%, p<0.001).
conclusionsA more targeted approach is needed with vulnerable families emphasising the importance of sleeping infants on their back and proactive planning infant sleep when there are disruptions to the normal routine, in particular to avoid hazardous co-sleeping.
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