SIDS is scary but research has shown us there are many ways to reduce the risk. We’ll discuss the “ABCs” of sleep and how evidence-based information can help reduce the number of SIDS cases there are. This week, I welcome Dr. Darria Gillespie, an ER doc and mom of three, to discuss how safe sleep practices can greatly reduce the risk of SIDS in your home.

 

She joins me to discuss:

• Safe sleep practices including the ABCs of sleep for infants
• How factors like bed sharing, sleep surfaces and infant age influence the risk of SIDS
• The importance of using evidence-based data to inform parent choices and reduce anxiety

 

Books by Paul Offit

https://www.jpma.org/ 

 

To connect with Dr. Darria Gillespie follow her on Instagram @drdarria and check out all her resources at https://drdarria.com/. For more safety tips, purchase Dr. Darria’s baby-proofing course at nopanicparenting.com. Use PEDSDOCTALK for 15% off her course.

 

Our podcasts are also now on YouTube. If you prefer a video podcast with closed captioning, check us out there and subscribe to PedsDocTalk TV.

 

We love the sponsors that make this show possible! You can always find all the special deals and codes for all our current sponsors on the PedsDocTalk Podcast Sponsorships page of the website.

00;00;00;00 – 00;00;18;12
Dr. Darria Gillespie
The risk factors that we know it contribute to cells, and we can talk about that in a minute. Really, they seem to still be being done. And, you know, it’s hard for a parent or parents are trying to be very good. And they’re certainly going to well intentioned this, but, you know, they see some marketing for a, a baby crib bumper.

00;00;18;12 – 00;00;33;19
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Those are marketed, you know, if you search on, you know, third party vendors, a lot of the time it’s really unsafe stuff that is being sold. And in the in the sponsored top rows, it’s hard for parents to know, which is why you know, why you do the work that you do, why I do the work that I do to.

00;00;33;19 – 00;00;35;02
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Why are we talking about this?

00;00;35;04 – 00;00;56;09
Dr. Mona
Welcome back to The Show a top parenting podcast because of you. And remember, we can keep it this way by you sharing episodes you love with friends, family, and on social media and tagging me and leaving those reviews. So many amazing guests to come and solo inspirational episodes. And if you like watching instead of listening alone, make sure to check out our episodes on YouTube.

00;00;56;10 – 00;01;19;10
Dr. Mona
Now let’s get into today’s conversation. I welcome Doctor Darria Long, an emergency physician, National bestselling author of Mom Hacks, TEDx X, speaker of the wildly popular An Ear Doctor on Ending the Crazy Busy, and a regular on national TV including CNN, NBC and Netflix. She is the founder of No Panic Parenting, the first baby proofing and baby safety course founded by an ear doctor.

00;01;19;12 – 00;01;44;02
Dr. Mona
She joins me to talk about what SIDs really is, how it differs from other causes of infant mortality, and share the latest statistics to see if progress is being made in reducing cases. We’ll dive into the key risk factors and how environmental influences in the home might play a role. Plus, we’ll discuss the current safe sleep guidelines, how to handle those moments when your baby rolls onto their tummy, and how to find a balance between safety and cultural practices like co-sleeping.

00;01;44;02 – 00;02;00;09
Dr. Mona
Knowing the evidence of SIDs. If you want to win Doctor Dario’s new course, as well as any pedes doc talk course of your liking, make sure to check out my Instagram on day of debut of this episode. Let’s get to the conversation. Thank you so much for joining me, doctor Daria.

00;02;00;12 – 00;02;03;29
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Hey, Mona. Doctor Mona, so good to see you. Thank you.

00;02;04;02 – 00;02;19;17
Dr. Mona
I think we’re okay on a first name basis. I will still call you Doctor Aria in my intro because that is who you are. But, Daria, I’m so excited. I, by the way, going back to that TEDx talk, I had to prepare for a Ted talk style conversation at the Pinnacle conference in May of.

00;02;19;21 – 00;02;22;22
Dr. Darria Gillespie
You know, Tony, an amazing conference and your.

00;02;22;22 – 00;02;38;00
Dr. Mona
TEDx talk was the example that they gave me. And so they were like, oh, look at this one. And I was like, okay. And I watched it and I was like, I loved it. I did all my research and the conversation and presentation went amazing. So I love it. You were an inspiration to me from a.

00;02;38;03 – 00;02;38;28
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Small.

00;02;39;01 – 00;02;59;27
Dr. Mona
Point, and I know we should continue to love, but really, I’m so excited to have you here. And you know, I’m really excited to talk to you today about SIDs. And of course, this is a very serious conversation. I know we’re starting this with a very light hearted love fest for each other, but we’re going to get into a lot about said some misconceptions, some statistics, just general things that I think will be so useful.

00;03;00;04 – 00;03;07;26
Dr. Mona
But before we get into that conversation, tell everyone a little bit more about yourself and what made you create no panic parenting.

00;03;07;28 – 00;03;26;05
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Yes. Thank you mom and I am so excited to be chatting here with you. So I have three kiddos and I had my third last July and he was a lot younger than my first two. He is not my older two are nine six. And then we had a baby come along and there was something that clicked with that third child.

00;03;26;07 – 00;03;59;25
Dr. Darria Gillespie
One I was now, you could say older. I’d like to say veteran mother. And I wasn’t so afraid that I was just going to, like, break this baby anymore. And I wanted to enjoy the time more. I also had ten more years of treating patients in the ER, taking care of little kids, taking care of accidents, looking those parents in the face sometimes when they were, you know, feeling so guilty or grieving and thinking, man, if I could have just talked to you two days, two hours ago, we may be could have prevented this.

00;03;59;25 – 00;04;17;18
Dr. Darria Gillespie
And so all of that clicked into place with baby number three. I had to go baby proof my own home. And I thought, we need to be telling parents different information. Because the information we’re getting on baby proofing that’s out there is not actually what I’m telling my patients and not what I think is the most important thing.

00;04;17;18 – 00;04;34;13
Dr. Darria Gillespie
And so that’s where it came from. That’s where no panic parenting came from. The idea being that you get the information you need, and then it brings you peace of mind that it doesn’t scare you more, that you can have that okay breath of fresh air. Now, I can take care of my baby. They’re safe and I can enjoy this time too.

00;04;34;15 – 00;04;55;26
Dr. Mona
Well, I think this is wonderful because I think what I’m seeing online, having been, online for about five, six, what, five, six years now, but also more so online than in my office, is that there is a there’s two feelings when it comes to safety. One is there’s some safety shaming and that parents who make mistakes or parents who don’t know all the information get shamed, like a lot of for me.

00;04;55;26 – 00;05;13;06
Dr. Mona
Is education, right? How how is a parent supposed to know what to do unless they’re taught right? And then the other thing that I see is that parents sometimes get too deep into the safety issues, meaning there’s so obsessive that they can’t find that healthy balance. Like there. It’s almost like when people talk so much about like, you know, don’t eat this and don’t do this.

00;05;13;06 – 00;05;31;01
Dr. Mona
So it’s almost like, how do we create this safety balance, understanding what the biggest risks are, not panicking like you’re saying, like not going into this rabbit hole of everything I’m going to do, my child is going to get injured or die or anything like that, but really make it easy to digest, which I think is what your platform is all about.

00;05;31;01 – 00;05;34;02
Dr. Mona
And I know panic parenting is all about that.

00;05;34;03 – 00;05;49;14
Dr. Darria Gillespie
And that’s exactly it is like, let’s give you the information, not in a way that it makes you more nervous, yes, but that it makes you feel more calm because I don’t want you relying. And I’d much rather somebody be aware. And that’s what we talk. You like my Ted talk? I talked about triaging your life. Now I talk about triaging baby proofing.

00;05;49;14 – 00;06;07;06
Dr. Darria Gillespie
So, like, let’s look at the risks so that you can if you protect against the 99% of the things or whatever, then you then you don’t have to think about them, then you’re not relying on luck or anything like that. You are actually you know, that your child’s protected. Then they can go. They can be freer, they can go play, they can go explore.

00;06;07;06 – 00;06;09;12
Dr. Darria Gillespie
And you can be less the more relaxed about it.

00;06;09;19 – 00;06;25;08
Dr. Mona
And, you know, of course, there are so many things to talk about when it comes to safety. And we’re only talking about SIDs because I, I don’t have enough hours in the day to talk to you about all the different safety things. And I’m sure we’ll have, you know, you’ll come on again and we’ll talk about other safety, safety issues that, that you see in the air especially.

00;06;25;13 – 00;06;44;22
Dr. Mona
But let’s talk about SIDs. And, you know, SIDs is a big thing. Obviously, I’ve seen it. You’ve seen it, more than we would want to, but maybe people listening may not know what it is. So can you explain what SIDs is, what it stands for, and how it differs from other causes of infant mortality? Or maybe some misconceptions that you hear about the definition of SIDs?

00;06;44;25 – 00;07;10;02
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Yeah, that’s a great question. Moana. And in part because it has changed even since you and I were in training, which was, cough, cough not that long ago. But so and when I talk about it, we kind of group all kind of potentially preventable deaths. That’s kind of like your umbrella. But when you say we’re talking about, you know, infants under one year old is really when you’re thinking about SIDs, really under four months is the greatest risk.

00;07;10;08 – 00;07;36;24
Dr. Darria Gillespie
So under that umbrella of potentially preventable deaths, there are outright accidents, car accident, fire fall or something like that. Then there is explained suicides, sudden unexpected infant deaths, and it’s called stats. You die. Those are ones that you initially didn’t know why we lost a child. But then the they looked into investigated and they found this baby had a congenital heart malformation.

00;07;36;26 – 00;07;57;17
Dr. Darria Gillespie
There was a pillow in the crib. They suffocated. As a kid. We figured it out. The third thing after you’ve excluded those two is SIDs. Meaning you lost the baby and we don’t know why. Now 90 to 95% of those have. And we’ll talk about those later. Some potentially preventable risk factors. You can say, well, these four things happened.

00;07;57;17 – 00;08;02;09
Dr. Darria Gillespie
These probably contributed, but we can’t point to the one that is SIDs.

00;08;02;11 – 00;08;24;16
Dr. Mona
Now let’s take a break to hear from our sponsors. This is so helpful because you just differentiated some things that I think parents may get confused on because the pillow like so unsafe sleep practices like having a pillow or falling asleep on like just say I. I’ve had situations where babies have passed away from sleep, like falling asleep on their caregivers, chest on the couch.

00;08;24;22 – 00;08;31;27
Dr. Mona
So would that be considered? Because there was a reason for it, or would that be considered SIDs using that as an example?

00;08;32;00 – 00;08;51;19
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Yeah. And it and that’s part of what’s so hard because it really depends on who the who’s a medical examiner and how they do it. There is a push to classify less as SIDs and more as a side effect for the reason. But that sometimes kind of comes down to judgment. If they can sleep comfortably because yes, was the thing versus we’re not sure that’s why those two are kind of fluid.

00;08;51;19 – 00;09;05;15
Dr. Darria Gillespie
And that’s why, like even when my course, when I talk about it on social, I can find all potentially preventable deaths because essentially the things that prevent side, are things that probably would have reduced the risk of SIDs too.

00;09;05;18 – 00;09;24;01
Dr. Mona
That is so helpful. And again, I love these definitions. And because even for me, I was just like, oh yes, that that is a great question for me to ask you because I’m learning more about the definitions. And I’m sure, like you said, it’s always changing. So it’s really important for us to stay up to date and have experts in the field that know more about this stuff and can educate, and I know we’ll get into so much more.

00;09;24;01 – 00;09;37;11
Dr. Mona
But what are the current statistics around SIDs? And has it increased in recent years? And do we have accurate data? Is it hard to get the data? Do we have international data or is it just the United States or how is it all taken and reported?

00;09;37;13 – 00;09;57;24
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Yeah, it it’s tough. It’s always tough to get kind of data. And especially if you look over 20 years because the definitions in terms of changed. Yeah. But we can get overall trend. So like 1992 was when the AP surfer started saying, you know, that maybe babies should sleep on their backs or their side back then. Then 94 was the Back to Sleep campaign.

00;09;57;27 – 00;10;18;21
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Before that, babies slept on their stomach. Which is why, you know, our parents and you know your listeners. Parents probably say, well, you didn’t sleep on your back and we can talk about how to handle that in a second, too. But so that was the Back to Sleep campaign. And as a result, there was a massive drop in SIDs from the mid 1990s to the mid 2000.

00;10;18;21 – 00;10;45;07
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Massive, huge. Then as a result, you know, they saw some Sid rising, but that was just probably definitions. Since then, since about mid 2000, SIDs rates have essentially been about the same. And then in some cases in the last couple of years seem to be increasing again. So but essentially the really biggest drop was back to sleep, and we haven’t been able to lower it significantly since then.

00;10;45;10 – 00;10;50;23
Dr. Mona
Interesting. And do we there’s no reason or understanding as to why like it’s kind of plateaued.

00;10;50;25 – 00;11;12;13
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Yeah it is. And again it’s you know the risk factors that we know it contribute to SIDs. And we can talk about that for a minute. Really they seem to still be being done. And, you know, it’s hard for a parent haunts or trying to be very good. And they’re sort of going to well intentioned is, but, you know, they see some marketing for a, a baby crib bumper.

00;11;12;13 – 00;11;28;25
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Those are so marketed, you can, you know, if you search on, you know, third party vendors a lot of the time it’s really unsafe stuff that is being sold. And in the in the sponsored top rows, it’s hard for parents to know, which is why. You know, why you do the work that you do, why I do the work that I do to why are we talking about this?

00;11;28;27 – 00;11;44;01
Dr. Mona
Yeah. And let’s get into that. The risk factors for SIDs. Are there certain groups of babies I know you had already alluded to the fact that under four months, you know, obviously under a year, but also definitely under four months, but let’s go over age group, but also any known risk factors as of now that we know for SIDs.

00;11;44;03 – 00;12;06;17
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Yeah. So since they say there’s a triple risk model that you probably know about, most of your, your listeners, some of them may know about that. There’s kind of three factors. It’s like the Swiss cheese model. The first is a baby who intrinsically has some vulnerability to SIDs. Maybe for some reason their arousal mechanism that wakes them up, it startles them is is just less developed.

00;12;06;17 – 00;12;32;28
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Or maybe they have some problem with their heart. Lungs are nervous. System two at the same time you have an external factors that baby who’s already vulnerable is put in an external situation. Maybe there is, you know, a pillow in their crib, maybe there is. There’s split bed sharing with somebody. Maybe they’re, you know, in any number of things there’s some external factor and that both of those two things happen at a critical development period for a baby.

00;12;33;01 – 00;12;48;22
Dr. Darria Gillespie
So when those three things line up is when you can get a baby where sense can happen. And so that’s when we look at that. The good thing is that there’s actually some interesting research happening on, you know, the babies that are vulnerable, that intrinsic vulnerability, because you used to be like, well, we couldn’t do anything about that.

00;12;48;22 – 00;13;00;03
Dr. Darria Gillespie
There’s some interesting research happening there. We’ll see. But then for parents that means like, okay, so let’s as parents look at that external environment because that is directly where parents can, can, can modify things.

00;13;00;06 – 00;13;13;17
Dr. Mona
And can control. Right? Because you bring up the fact that if there is an intrinsic thing, I’m sure parents like, well, how do I know my baby has one of those intrinsic things? And to be clear, one of the biggest things we do, obviously we do checkups just to make sure, like baby’s growing, we check heart, lungs, basics.

00;13;13;22 – 00;13;22;29
Dr. Mona
But there’s no at this point at the as it stands, there’s no test to find out which of those babies have more of the intrinsic risk factor. Correct.

00;13;23;02 – 00;13;28;03
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Yeah, that’d be great. You. Yeah. So yeah. So we have the power plant as an external.

00;13;28;05 – 00;13;39;11
Dr. Mona
Awesome. So yeah we’re trying to, we’re trying to modify and just control the controllables like we talk about with so much of safety. So helpful. And is there any certain environmental factors in the home that can increase the risk of.

00;13;39;11 – 00;13;59;29
Dr. Darria Gillespie
SIDs 100%. So when you look at, say, 90 to 95% of SIDs cases, they found at least one modifiable risk factor, which to me, I read that it’s both tragic, but it’s also kind of empowering for parents. It’s like, okay, that means that there are things that we can do. One of the biggest things is, is safe sleep.

00;13;59;29 – 00;14;22;19
Dr. Darria Gillespie
And, you know, make sure you’re making sure that your baby is in a safe sleep environment. Another one is exposures. So exposure to nicotine, alcohol, marijuana, opioids, illicit drugs, you know, there’s a lot more, you know, Marriott, Marriott, THC, CBD news, and all of those things can potentially increase your risk. Not getting routine immunizations is actually associated with an increased risk of SIDs.

00;14;22;19 – 00;14;23;01
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Oh, but.

00;14;23;01 – 00;14;25;23
Dr. Mona
Doctor Daria, everyone says it’s the opposite on social.

00;14;25;23 – 00;14;29;17
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Media. I was just about to mention extras. I think.

00;14;29;19 – 00;14;30;11
Dr. Mona
You’re saying that.

00;14;30;17 – 00;14;31;10
Dr. Darria Gillespie
You like because.

00;14;31;10 – 00;14;51;14
Dr. Mona
The amount of anti-vaxxers like, literally. I mean, people need to hear this like a child will die. Like I’m being honest. Like maybe an influencers child or someone post that their child has died and all of a sudden the anti-vaxxers like to use that child as the poster child for why not to vaccinate? Oh well. Oh, two weeks ago they got the DTaP vaccine, or two weeks ago they got this.

00;14;51;14 – 00;15;05;15
Dr. Mona
And then what happened? So let’s be clear here vaccines do not cause SIDs. They actually can be protective. So I agree with that. Obviously. But it is very true. And do not believe all the things you see on social that are misinformed and are not correct.

00;15;05;18 – 00;15;27;03
Dr. Darria Gillespie
I was literally about to enforce that, to make sure that people heard that not getting vaccines is what increases the risk of SIDs. And it’s it’s frustrating because for parents, again, they’re trying to do the right thing. Yes. And as a parent, you’re kind of you get nervous about everything. And then you see in your feed somebody saying that these vaccines caused x, Y, z.

00;15;27;03 – 00;15;55;07
Dr. Darria Gillespie
And it is impossible as a parent to not get a little nervous about that. You know, I my kids are getting their vaccine. And in the back of my head I was like, oh, it’s you know, I was remembering these things that you’ve heard. Yes. People in redacted who have have been lost their license. And it is and I knew that these vaccines are protective, but that was just, you know, my mommy gut mommy like, oh, you know, I hate that I even have to worry about this, but it’s because we worry about you.

00;15;55;07 – 00;16;14;20
Dr. Mona
Just I love that you just brought that up because you are a physician, you know? And same thing happened to me. And I like to be clear about this because my my son, I have obviously a son and a younger daughter, my son had a stroke and seizures at birth. Okay. And when it came time to his two month vaccines, my neurologist was like, hey, look, it’s up to you if you want to get the vaccines and why are we having this conversation?

00;16;14;20 – 00;16;37;05
Dr. Mona
As two physicians, you know, me and a pediatric neurologist. And the risk was there is a low risk of the vaccine, as we know, causing febrile seizures if it’s given with conjunction with other vaccines. This is not hidden information. This is on all the labels and all the things. But it’s low. The risk is so low. But she left it up to me and we discussed it and I gave my son the vaccines on schedule.

00;16;37;05 – 00;16;54;22
Dr. Mona
But my mommy heart that night was awake. The whole night. I just was weak, even though I knew. And so I, I love that you’re sharing this, because going on that tangent about vaccines and SIDs and all of that, it is not it is not abnormal for you to want the best for your child and want to think, well, could it happen?

00;16;55;00 – 00;17;09;08
Dr. Mona
But we know that these risks are, you know, the risk of a febrile seizure is low. And we know that there’s no association between SIDs and vaccines as it stands. And if it were, we wouldn’t be recommending them. Right? I mean, this is obviously we want the best for our children.

00;17;09;11 – 00;17;12;25
Dr. Darria Gillespie
And my baby just got his vaccines for the year, you know.

00;17;12;28 – 00;17;28;10
Dr. Mona
Yes, I love I love that you brought that up. Thank you. I know that was I feel like that’s important conversations for people to hear, especially from two physician mothers who do want the best for our kids and also the best for our patients. And thank you for that segue on SIDs and vaccines. And, I love this loop.

00;17;28;10 – 00;17;52;01
Dr. Darria Gillespie
I know you have a really smart audience. If anybody wants to read something about, about this Doctor Paul Offit, I know, I’m sure you know him. He’s a, pediatric immunologist, infectious disease. He’s, he sits on the boards looking at vaccines. He’s just absolutely brilliant. Personal friend too. He’s the one when I when there was a measles outbreak, I’m emailing like, do I need to do something about this early?

00;17;52;01 – 00;18;09;11
Dr. Darria Gillespie
If my baby has a new book out called Tell Me When It’s Over, it’s about, oh, good, it’s about vaccines. And so now when somebody asks me, I always say, go read Paul Offit to book. He is 30,000 times smarter than I am. And he has researched this and it’s a wonderful book. So anybody looking at it.

00;18;09;13 – 00;18;31;27
Dr. Mona
I need to read that and I’m going to link it. Thank you, I love it I love getting this evidence base. You know, people who get it like it’s really important to spread the right information, especially when we’re talking about something as serious as SIDs. We don’t want to spread that misinformation. And like we said, if we knew that there was an issue, nobody in their right mind, pediatricians included, and your docs would want that for our families and for our children.

00;18;31;27 – 00;18;38;13
Dr. Mona
So and our patients. So really, it’s really important to remember to get the information from the right places. Okay, back to SIDs because I want to go get through about.

00;18;38;15 – 00;18;54;08
Dr. Darria Gillespie
A few other things too. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, you know, if you can, feeding your baby with breast milk has some protective thing. Okay. If there are mothers out there who cannot feed their baby or the rest milk, it is okay. But if you can, it might be protective. I know two of my kids. Yes, one third one I couldn’t.

00;18;54;08 – 00;19;06;13
Dr. Darria Gillespie
So that’s okay. Using a pacifier in the first six months, there’s some protective effect for that. And then lastly is avoid overheating baby by making it to warm in the room or putting too many clothes on them.

00;19;06;16 – 00;19;14;23
Dr. Mona
So those are all better. More so, probably because it just has that sucking. Like just to kind of keep them in, like a like. Is there a reason we know why the pacifier would be helpful.

00;19;14;23 – 00;19;26;21
Dr. Darria Gillespie
For sucking that kind of airway? And it can it’s not like if they use it, it is. If they don’t, it’s going to cause it. But if something that they have found just use it without a leash. Obviously you don’t want anything. Yeah. Leash wise or string in that crib. Yeah.

00;19;26;21 – 00;19;45;15
Dr. Mona
And you know, like we said, I had a baby who was formula fed, who was one baby who was breastfed. And then I had a baby who took a pacifier and a baby who didn’t take a pacifier. So I never really worried so much about the lack of pacifier use or the lack of breastfeeding. But again, we’re trying to create these most, you know, optimal situations and looking at what we know as of now.

00;19;45;17 – 00;19;59;15
Dr. Mona
Amazing. Well, thank you for sharing that. And of course, a lot of the SIDs, discussions that we have surround safe sleep. So what are the current guidelines for safe sleep to reduce the risk of SIDs? Now let’s take a break to hear from our sponsors.

00;19;59;18 – 00;20;26;17
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Yes. And one thing I also want to mention, and we were talking about stats. I really didn’t mention this, but just to kind of go back to the intro, the reason we’re talking about SIDs is because SIDs and suffocation, during sleep, it’s the number one cause of death, for infants under one. And it’s, so just really, really important that we be talking about this, and both again, kind of grouping any other SIDs and suffocation during sleep, which is why one of the number one things you can do for SIDs is safe sleep.

00;20;26;20 – 00;20;55;29
Dr. Darria Gillespie
That’s. So that brings us to that. So kind of the overarching thing that I tell people, it’s easy. I tell parents, I tell grandparents the ABCs of sleep, baby need to sleep alone on their back and in their crib. So by alone I mean nothing is in that group. And of course, that also includes in a an approved bassinet for the first 2 to 3 months if you’d rather that and my bassinet not a co-sleeping bed sharing device, but a true JPM certified bassinet.

00;20;56;02 – 00;21;14;02
Dr. Darria Gillespie
So alone. No blankets, no pillows, no nothing. But it’s your baby. It’s a sleep sack, and it’s an optional passive pacifier. There’s nothing else. There’s no bumpers, no mesh bumpers, no nothing. Ouch. I see, I’m so. I’m getting so excited. Moana. I’m hitting my funny bone on my desk. I just, make it right in it.

00;21;14;02 – 00;21;24;15
Dr. Mona
I know, I know, I love it, I love them, I love that the podcasts are not on video. So if you want to, you know, go from audio to video and watch Doctor Daria hit her elbow. Being so excited. Watch this on YouTube.

00;21;24;17 – 00;21;37;02
Dr. Darria Gillespie
This this podcast brought to you by Doctor Daria. Yes. And so and again on their back, we talked about back to sleep and also in their crib or bassinet. No other.

00;21;37;02 – 00;21;51;24
Dr. Mona
Places. Yeah. So going back to what you had mentioned earlier about the Back to Sleep campaign in the 90s and that reduction. And then, you know, we talk about our parents saying, well, you know, we all slept with ten blankets and, you know, you were on your belly because babies sleep better on their belly, all of that stuff.

00;21;51;24 – 00;21;58;19
Dr. Mona
What would you say for that? For those families who are being told that from their, you know, from their parents who said, well, everyone survived.

00;21;58;21 – 00;22;20;19
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Yeah, well everyone survived. So that is the title. There is survivor bias or survivorship bias. And it includes essentially taking the anecdotes around your world where people ended up okay. And assuming that that is universal. Yeah. So I use this for causes. People say, well, we didn’t put your car seats. You wrote in buckets in the back of the truck and you were all, okay.

00;22;20;21 – 00;22;42;18
Dr. Darria Gillespie
So was that yes, I was okay. Yes, my siblings were okay. But actually in the 1980s because of before they had car seats, actually, several thousand children died. Yeah. Just because of cars not using car seats. So just because we were okay does not mean that that actually was what happened on the population standpoint. So that’s actually not true.

00;22;42;18 – 00;22;59;27
Dr. Darria Gillespie
That is your lens. It’s actually not true. Everybody was not okay. And secondly, the beauty of population health is that something bad didn’t have to die. It happened. I didn’t have to die in a car accident for me to know that. Actually, it’s a really good thing to put my child in a car seat. So that’s the beauty of population health.

00;23;00;04 – 00;23;22;03
Dr. Darria Gillespie
We use the data from an entire population, a generation of infants, so that we can do better for this new generation. So one is no, it wasn’t okay for everybody. Two here’s a data. Three is remember somebody was telling you that they might be feeling guilty. They might be feeling judged. That happened. Yeah. So I also try to come at this not with like you’re a jerk.

00;23;22;03 – 00;23;37;00
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Here’s some data slap in your face because say, you know, not everybody was okay. You did the best with the information you had. We didn’t know any better. Yeah, now we do. And we’re going to take that and make it a better, safer world for our babies. So this is why we’re doing this?

00;23;37;07 – 00;23;51;13
Dr. Mona
No, I love that you brought that up. Obviously I was I was expecting you to bring up the survivorship bias and how that applies to so many things related to safety. And again, going back to how we started the conversation, the goal here is to prevent as many preventable deaths as we can, right? I mean, that’s the goal.

00;23;51;13 – 00;24;08;25
Dr. Mona
And we understand that there’s rare cases that even if you do all the best things that, you know, accidents happen and all that with drownings, with car accidents, with, you know, with safe sleep, all that stuff. But we want to give that information and hope parents make the choices that make sense, but that follows the evidence and follows what is, you know, we were discussing here.

00;24;09;01 – 00;24;35;22
Dr. Mona
And that kind of brings me to something that I wanted to talk about, which, you know, I had this pediatrician from India, and obviously India has a billion people. I’m not exaggerating, but billion people and 100 hundreds of millions of children. And, co-sleeping is very common in India. And I a lot of my listeners may be tuning in and most of my listeners are evidence based and understand safe sleep, but there are some listeners that may be like, look, it’s culturally what we do, and it’s just something that has been done for generations.

00;24;35;25 – 00;24;54;19
Dr. Mona
And I guess my question to you is how can we be compassionate to cultural practices but also discuss safety concerns? And is there an in between in your eyes? And it’s okay if there’s not. But you know, when I talk to that pediatrician and I asked him about the safety and I said, you know, what are you what do you tell your your parents?

00;24;54;19 – 00;25;08;29
Dr. Mona
And he said, Moana, in our in our culture, there’s no other option. Like, you know, you think about income, you think about this like I, you know, we do the best we can. We talk about not putting pillows in the bed. We talk about all these things. But we also have to understand that some of our families are multiple children.

00;25;08;29 – 00;25;20;20
Dr. Mona
So I guess, what is your thought on that and understanding the cultural differences that may exist and how we can save more lives this way, knowing the risks that we know. And you have seen in in that hours and stuff.

00;25;20;23 – 00;25;36;10
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Yeah, absolutely. So when I think about it in bed sharing, so that if you look at that, what the AARP is calling the term now is bed sharing. I feel like there’s there’s three categories that parents fall into. There are those who say, this is our culture is to bed share. We share the bed with them, so we choose to do it.

00;25;36;12 – 00;25;51;29
Dr. Darria Gillespie
There are those who say, I’m never going to bed. Share. And then at three in the morning, the baby’s not sleeping and they are so exhausted they don’t know what to do. And then they bring the baby into their bed. Those people feel guilty about bed sharing that they shouldn’t, and they’re like, I don’t know what to do.

00;25;52;01 – 00;26;11;06
Dr. Darria Gillespie
And then there’s those who don’t bed chair. And you know, each of those kind of deserves to be broken out and get some slightly different communications because they have different issues. Yeah. What I do tell everybody is I do want them to have the statistics. AARP has some really good stats on this and they say bed sharing.

00;26;11;08 – 00;26;28;10
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Just bad sharing in general across the board increases an infant’s risk of SIDs by three times. So you take the baseline said you’re sharing a bed with that infant. It’s three times higher. And then I just like to give them a little more information because what are even higher risk factors. Because if I can tell you the risk factors then you can make judgments.

00;26;28;10 – 00;26;50;06
Dr. Darria Gillespie
So yeah just to increase it by, you know, five times more to five times three. So now you said you 15 times more bed sharing with the preterm or low birth weight. Yes. Bed sharing on soft surfaces. Bed sharing which which includes your crib or, you know, darker tots and you know, things we don’t want to mention those, but yes.

00;26;50;09 – 00;27;10;01
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Again, bed sharing with an infant under four months old and beds. Interesting bed sharing with anybody who is not the parent. So another relative or a child. And then interestingly, just to round it all out, the pieces of the factors that are three times ten tonight or 30 times responses is bed sharing with anybody who is impaired.

00;27;10;03 – 00;27;16;15
Dr. Darria Gillespie
But they do find that there’s anybody who is impaired by alcohol, sedating medications, drugs or fatigue. I was like, well, that’s why.

00;27;16;17 – 00;27;18;14
Dr. Mona
Everybody yeah, yeah.

00;27;18;16 – 00;27;40;24
Dr. Darria Gillespie
That Venn diagram just made an entire circle. So what I say is cultures when they bed share, it’s like, well, if you want to bed share, there’s not a safe way to do it. There are ways to lower the risk. And I try I don’t want to just tell parents, no, don’t bed share, go away. Because then they might think the bed share anyways and then they’re going to do it.

00;27;40;26 – 00;28;02;14
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Even un un un safer, whatever the word is for that. So it’s like, okay, the things that make it worse pre-term infant baby under four months, anything soft. So if you want to bed share you should be sleeping on a flat, very, very thin mattress on the floor. You need to be wearing your own sleep sack like the baby is, so there aren’t really any pillows or sheets there.

00;28;02;19 – 00;28;23;29
Dr. Darria Gillespie
And it is just really, it’s the mom, really the dad and the dad. If you look at risk factors, it’s actually the mother. Is less of a risk factor is a dad. Again, the data is not perfect here, but just, you know, not some other relative and not in a place they begin falling bewitched. If you don’t wish to do those things, then let’s find a different way.

00;28;23;29 – 00;28;29;16
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Something other than bed sharing, because those are the only ways to slightly lower the risk.

00;28;29;19 – 00;28;46;11
Dr. Mona
I’m giving a slow clap if you can’t hear it. Let me tell you something. I really appreciate that answer, and that is kind of where I’m coming from when it comes to safety. And you said it perfectly. Like if we as pediatricians tell parents you’re ridiculous, you’re stupid, you shouldn’t bed share, you’re a bad parent, then they’re going to do it anyways, and they’re never going to be told.

00;28;46;17 – 00;29;03;04
Dr. Mona
Here are the risk factors in a compassionate, educated way. And this is how I approach things. And Doctor Daria, that’s why I really like your platform, because this is exactly what I look out for and fellow pediatricians. And I’m going to be honest with you, that doesn’t always exist in social media education. It is a lot of shaming.

00;29;03;08 – 00;29;23;18
Dr. Mona
There is a lot of extremes on both sides, right? I mean, we see clinicians who say bad sharing is bad, bad, bad did it. It and then we also see people who are not pediatricians that are like, there’s no risk. It’s what God intended. It’s what biology intended. I’m like, yo, yeah, this is both wrong. We’re both wrong here in that we need to know what is it that the family needs?

00;29;23;18 – 00;29;38;12
Dr. Mona
What are the issues that they have? Do they know how to reduce the risk? And do they understand that even with that risk reduction of bed sharing, it’s higher than that bed sharing. And as long as they know that, which is what we just talked about, they can make the choice that makes sense for their families. But they need to know the risk.

00;29;38;14 – 00;29;53;29
Dr. Mona
And that is what gets me so passionate and why I’m happy that you came on, is that both of those extremes make me lose my lose hair and go gray. But the one you know when we say that there’s no risk. Like when I find videos that are like, oh, you know, it’s biology for your child to be close.

00;29;53;29 – 00;30;04;28
Dr. Mona
And I’m like, guys, it’s biology for a lot of things, but kids can die. And back in the day when we were in like caveman era, you’re probably sleeping on a floor, like on a rocky bed.

00;30;05;02 – 00;30;05;19
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Right.

00;30;05;21 – 00;30;17;01
Dr. Mona
On pillows and all that. So it’s not biology. Things have changed. There’s soft, cushiony pillows. There’s dad who snores heavily and rolls over on their baby and is not afraid of the wolves. So there’s going to be.

00;30;17;01 – 00;30;36;24
Dr. Darria Gillespie
A risk, right? Exactly that. That is. Amen to that resolution. Nearly 80% of children are larger. They didn’t make it out of, you know, adolescence. Yeah. So let’s not I don’t actually want to go back to biology like the childbirth. It was in the high rates of death. We don’t have that right.

00;30;36;27 – 00;30;53;05
Dr. Mona
Oh. Thank you. I really appreciated that. I loved your response. And I obviously didn’t know. You know, people don’t know, but I don’t know my guest responses before they come on the show. So I was like just listening and waiting to hear what you said. And I really thought that was such a compassionate answer. That really goes back to the evidence, which is what I want to do on my platforms too.

00;30;53;05 – 00;31;05;13
Dr. Mona
And that’s why I’m happier here, but also understands people like understands the patient and family dynamic in front of us. And how can we better communicate from a place of compassion and not fear? And that is what we’re doing. Yeah. So thank you. Oh love.

00;31;05;13 – 00;31;07;07
Dr. Darria Gillespie
It, love love love it I.

00;31;07;07 – 00;31;24;16
Dr. Mona
Have I do have one more question before we, you know, before we go, of course there’s some marketing gimmicks out there. How just in a general piece. How can a parent know what’s safe, like, you know, you talked about whether it’s approved. Is there certain labels that should be on devices and products because so many things are there, like wedges for mattresses.

00;31;24;16 – 00;31;33;20
Dr. Mona
And, you know, this thing and I it’s like boggles my mind how a lot of these things are still on the market. So what would you be your your advice for parents who are purchasing things for their cribs actually.

00;31;33;22 – 00;31;58;22
Dr. Darria Gillespie
So I, I talk about this a lot. No panic parenting because like it’s it’s hard for parents to know it can be very difficult and you can’t listen to the marketing messages. You’ll be led astray. So, but to try to boil down a little bit of what I see a lot more in depth there. So for instance, there’s the JPM, the Juvenile Product Manufacturing Association, baby ticket items, car seats, cribs, high chairs, baby gates, all of those have JPM certifications.

00;31;58;22 – 00;32;23;04
Dr. Darria Gillespie
They have CPSC regulations that they have to meet. And they’re still bad ones that flood the market, of course. But what I’d say if you want to buy those, go to the JPM website. I have it in my course. I’m happy to share the link with you. Money to put in your show notes. Of of the JP and you can go there and you can say, okay, I’m looking at cribs and you can they have a big dropdown, you can click on cribs, and then you will see the brands that file to the JPM for certain.

00;32;23;10 – 00;32;43;27
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Nice. So you can say okay, it doesn’t say like buy this one crib but it says oh okay. These four brands meet you know follow up with the JP mays. So these brands are going to be safer. So now you can choose from those brands if we’re for all these different items. And then I say once you go to buy them three places to buy them because remember of they’re fake products on the market all the time.

00;32;43;27 – 00;33;10;21
Dr. Darria Gillespie
There’s, you know, doona car seats. There’s have been flooded by fake doona cars. Yeah. So I say this doona says that themselves that they’re fake doona cars. It’s they’re labeled as doona and they fail in all the car seat testing. So when you go to buy these big ticket items that really matter for safety, three places either buy it directly from the manufacturer, but from the brand themselves, buy them from a number two is to buy them from a a big box store.

00;33;10;23 – 00;33;28;14
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Target Walmart. Bye bye baby. Some store that has a big reputation that you know that they didn’t just go buy them off of Joe’s back truck, back of his truck for a deal. And then thirdly, if you do buy it from a third party, like an Amazon or something, make sure you’re going to that brand store front on Amazon.

00;33;28;14 – 00;33;38;28
Dr. Darria Gillespie
And again, not Joe’s baby conglomerate. Yeah, on Amazon, but from the actual the classic brand, they’re doing a brand store like that to make sure what you make.

00;33;39;01 – 00;34;00;04
Dr. Mona
Very helpful because you don’t want to go on Etsy randomly. Please. Like, I went on Etsy and it was like all these bump like crib bumpers and like cushions and I’m like, because there’s no regulation in there, right? I mean, people are able to put stuff online. So this is super helpful. And I will obviously be linking the no panic parenting, but I will do a separate link for the JPM certification for because I do think it’s important free information out there too.

00;34;00;07 – 00;34;17;17
Dr. Mona
But we’ll be I mean, we went through so much today and I really appreciate you going through the evidence and also just practical ways for us to, you know, reduce this risk for SIDs. What would be your final uplifting message for everyone listening? And this is a question I ask all of my guests as a take home as they approach this parenting journey.

00;34;17;18 – 00;34;27;03
Dr. Mona
We had this heavy conversation about SIDs. We did laugh a little bit because I love you and that’s what we do. But what would be your final uplifting message for all of our listeners tuning in today?

00;34;27;05 – 00;34;41;19
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Okay, I think I would say to all of us, especially the new parents, to be you are going to have that moment. The baby gets put in your arms and you think, oh my goodness, I’m going to break this thing. I’m going to break a baby. I remember being an intern in a residency. It was my first week.

00;34;41;21 – 00;35;00;23
Dr. Darria Gillespie
And I go into the first room and it’s a four day old. And my attending professor, I’m talking to the mom that comes to point. I need to pick up this baby. And I start to kind of pick him up like I reproach him, like he’s a onesie. Like I’m going to pick him up by his shoulders. And my intent is he was behind the mother.

00;35;00;23 – 00;35;14;08
Dr. Darria Gillespie
And I guess if is watching this video, they can see he’s behind the mother. And he looks at me with big eyes. He goes, hey, I’m like under the bus, gesturing to me, putting a hand up, and I suddenly I come back to my senses. I remember what to do. I put a hand on the baby’s back. I lift him up.

00;35;14;08 – 00;35;43;28
Dr. Darria Gillespie
We’re fine. As we walked out of the room, my attending very kindly said, great job, and don’t worry, when they’re born they pop out with a manual. I was like so and do things. We all have this moment so and every parent is going to develop their parents got their mommy got, their dad got. And you listen to that and that guide you so often and then find people that you trust myself Mona Doktor Mona trustworthy person.

00;35;44;05 – 00;35;58;18
Dr. Darria Gillespie
So you have your mommy got and you supplant it with those, those experts around you that you can trust. And then there’s lots of other noise. Try to block that out and always find those things that you trust and not equate your baby’s going to be great, and they’re lucky to have you as a parent.

00;35;58;25 – 00;36;05;18
Dr. Mona
I love it. Daria. Thank you. Where can everyone go to stay connected? Find out more about No Panic parenting. Give us all that details right now.

00;36;05;24 – 00;36;28;01
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Yes. So Instagram you mentioned I’m at Daria. That’s where I’m most active. I’m on other platforms too, but that’s where I’m the very most active. It’s TikTok at the real doctor, Daria, because I can’t figure out my handle there. And long story. And then, of course, no panic. Parenting is just no panic parenting.com. And, would love to see people there reach out to me in any way.

00;36;28;01 – 00;36;33;06
Dr. Darria Gillespie
And I’d love to help parents keep their baby safer and give them themselves some sanity as well.

00;36;33;09 – 00;36;35;25
Dr. Mona
Thank you Doctor Daria for joining me. This was awesome.

00;36;36;01 – 00;36;38;14
Dr. Darria Gillespie
Thank you Doctor Mona. Have a great day.

00;36;38;16 – 00;37;01;12
Dr. Mona
As we wrap up today’s episode, remember that every family’s journey is unique and so are their sleep practices. Our goal is to provide evidence based information while respecting cultural traditions and individual choices. My podcast has so many guests from different backgrounds, including on sleep, so make sure you check out other conversations about sleep and understand the balance of safety and also personal choice.

00;37;01;14 – 00;37;21;18
Dr. Mona
At the heart of it all, we’re here to support you in creating the safest environment for your baby to thrive. If you love this conversation, make sure to leave a review, share it on social media and comment on our real that debuted on the same day as this episode. And make sure to check out The Real for giveaway for a chance to win a No panic parenting course, as well as a doctor’s course of your choice.

00;37;21;20 – 00;37;25;09
Dr. Mona
Thanks for joining me and I cannot wait to chat with you all next week. Stay well.