Maternal and Child Health Library

MCH Alert: Focus on Infant Mortality is developed by the Maternal and Child Health Library in collaboration with the National Sudden and Unexpected Infant/Child and Pregnancy Loss Resource Center at Georgetown University. This and past issues are available online at http://www.mchlibrary.info/alert/archives.html and http://www.sidscenter.org/alert/archives.html.

March 26, 2010

Featured Multimedia Resource: The National Sudden Unexpected Infant-Child Death and Pregnancy Loss Resource Center's Web site contains archived and resource materials from the February 11, 2010, Webinar entitled "Sudden Unexpected Infant Death (SUID): Research, Success and Challenges." The Webinar, sponsored by the Association of SIDS and Infant Mortality Professionals (ASIP) and the Association of Maternal and Child Health Programs (AMCHP), is one in a series sponsored by ASIP and AMCHP. The Webinar archive and resources are available at http://www.sidscenter.org/asip_amchp

Readers: The next issue of MCH Alert will be published on April 9, 2010.

1. BIBLIOGRAPHIES FOCUS ON APNEA MONITORING, APPARENT LIFE-THREATENING EVENTS, AND SEROTONIN RESEARCH AND SIDS

The National Sudden and Unexpected Infant-Child Death and Pregnancy Loss Resource Center's Web site contains three updated bibliographies on the topics of apnea monitoring, apparent life-threatening events, and serotonin research and sudden infant death syndrome. Each bibliography lists recent citations and abstracts selected by resource center staff from PubMed, a service of the National Library of Medicine that includes citations from MEDLINE and other life science journals. The bibliographies also include a customized tool that can be used to search PubMed for additional articles (including links to full text and other resources) on the selected topic. The updated bibliographies include the following titles:

* Apnea Monitoring and Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS): A Selected Annotated Bibliography is available at http://www.sidscenter.org/TopicalBib/ApneaMonitoring.html

* Apparent Life-Threatening Events (ALTE) and Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS): A Selected Annotated Bibliography is available at http://www.sidscenter.org/TopicalBib/ALTE.html

* Serotonin Research and Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS): A Selected Annotated Bibliography is available at
http://www.sidscenter.org/TopicalBib/SerotoninResearch.html

Resource Center bibliographies on other topics are also available at http://sidscenter.org/TopicalBibliographies.html

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• The total number of infant deaths attributed to RDS in the United States decreased more than fivefold from 1980 to 2005. A greater than twofold decrease occurred for other respiratory diseases.
• Among all U.S. infant deaths due to non-RDS respiratory diseases from 1980 to 2005, congenital anomalies of the respiratory system was the overall leading cause of infant mortality in most years.
• In 2005, 97 percent of deaths due to RDS occurred in the neonatal period (from birth to age 27 days). For infant deaths due to all other respiratory diseases, 78 percent of deaths occurred in the neonatal period.
• There was a significant disparity in mortality rates between races and genders, and the gap is widening between races for RDS. Disparities existed for race and gender for other respiratory causes of infant mortality over the 25-year period but did not significantly widen, as they did for RDS.
• About 91 percent of RDS deaths occurred in the early preterm group in both 1995 and 2004.

• Between 2000 and 2003, there were 19 ATB deaths and 92 UND deaths in NYC that met the case definitions for SUIDs with possible SRFs.
• All 19 ATB deaths resulted from hazardous sleeping environments and were categorized as deaths with SRFs.
• Of the ATB deaths, 37 percent were found in the prone position at the time of death, 53 percent were sleeping in an adult bed, and 53 percent were bedsharing. Information on the presence of soft bedding, pillows, or blankets was reported for the majority of infants (53 percent).
• Of the 92 UND deaths, 69 (75 percent) had SRFs based on information obtained through the OCME records. The remaining 23 deaths did not have sufficient information on the OCME records to permit classification for SRFs.
• The ATB and UND death rate was two to four times higher for black non-Hispanic infants than for all other racial/ethnic groups, and infants born to adolescent mothers (under age 20) had a significantly higher death rate than those born to mothers ages 20 and older.