More than half of cot death cases occur whilst a baby is sleeping in a bed or on a sofa with their parents new research from respected Bristol professor finds.<\/p>\n
The rate of cot death in the UK has dropped since the early 90s and all new parents are very aware of putting their baby on their back to sleep, at the foot of the cot and to avoid contact with tobacco.<\/p>\n
A team of researchers at the Universities of Bristol and Warwick led by Peter Fleming, Professor of Infant Health and Development Physiology at the University of Bristol, studied cot deaths in the South West area of Bristol occurring over a two year period.<\/p>\n
Of 80 cot deaths investigated, more than half occurred while the parent was co-sleeping with their baby.<\/p>\n
In these cases, links were also found between the parent’s alcohol or drug consumption.<\/p>\n
New risk factors also appear to be emerging contributing to cot death including the use of a pillow and trendy baby swaddling.<\/p>\n
The report confirms that the safest place of a baby to sleep is in a cot beside parent’s beds for the first six months of life.<\/p>\n
Parents should never put themselves in a position where they may fall asleep with a baby on a sofa and never co-sleep with a baby if they have been drinking or taking drugs.<\/p>\n
The research was published in the BMJ on 14 October 2009.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
More than half of cot death cases occur whilst a baby is sleeping in a bed or on a sofa<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5036","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bristol-news"],"yoast_head":"\n