welcome back we are here this week for our weekly sit down Sunday Q+A where we answer
questions from you that you've given us over the past couple of weeks this week
we are talking about bed sharing co-sleeping room sharing surface sharing yeah all of the
sleeping arrangements as well as thoughts on some pregnancy and parenting books and
just in case it's your first time meeting us I'm Kurt I'm a board certified pediatrician
and Dad I'm Sarah I'm a board-certified ob gyn and Mom and we are the Doctors Bjorkman
so starting out a first question comes from Annie Chen and she says hello doctors can you
please talk about the research on co-sleeping with your baby pros and cons and is it safe
this is a great question there's a lot of variables here I'm going to try to kind of
go through them the highlights Point by point and then maybe we'll have to do a full episode
on this in the upcoming weeks or months as we get to it the first thing the term co-sleeping
um I'm just going to say we're not going to use that for the description it's because co-sleeping
oftentimes when people think about co-sleeping the thing about sleeping in the same bed with a child
but really the term co-sleeping actually just means sleeping in the same room as and so to try
to be a little bit more clear in our language we want to say surface sharing or bed sharing where
like a care provider and the infant is sleeping on the same surface so this could be in a bed a couch
a chair any of those places okay and then room sharing which is where parents are sleeping on
a different surface than the child in the same room got it so oh surface sharing co-sleeping
we're just gonna it's different we're not okay bed sharing or Surface sharing is one thing about
okay versus room sharing okay now the American Academy of Pediatrics actually has some really
good recommendations on this that is backed up by lots and lots of studies um we'll try to link
those in the description below if you want to go and look at some of the original research and
literature yourself um the data in terms of these things so there's actually an increased sorry a
decreased risk of sudden infant and death syndrome meaning that it's less likely that your infant
will have sudden infant death if the parent is sleeping in the same room as your infant through
six months of age and so for this reason the AAP actually recommends room sharing up to six months
keep baby in your room until six months it's the aap's recommendation okay now and we've shared
how like we started the sleep learning for our own child in that four to six month range and so
um the biggest risk for sudden infant death syndrome is really between kind of two weeks
and like two months months of life up to up to four months of life is kind of the biggest high
peak window and so for us we felt like that was relatively safe but it does happen in children
unfortunately up to a year of age the flip side of that is the risk of bed sharing surface sharing
so there are many people who say hey sharing the bed with my baby is going to help promote
breastfeeding that the baby's just right next to the boob you pop them on you're more likely
to breastfeed there may be some help with and bonding Etc which there's some data to say that
maybe that's a little bit better bonding between the parents in bed sharing since instances there's
also some data that show if you're still bed sharing past six years of life kind of rare but
there's increased rates of psychopathy sociopathy in those children that are still bed sharing kind
of well through childhood so there's studies on all of this and I realize it's a bit minutia
um however there isn't significant detriment to your child to not sharing a surface and there is
potentially and there actually is significantly increased risk of sudden infant death when
children share the bed or a surface with their parents now these rates go up even more if the
provider is smoking some of that could be that there could be some issues that happened if Mom
was smoking during childbirth or during pregnancy that kind of increases their risk of maybe having
some issues but also even just after birth If the parents one and or two increases the risk of that
any illicit drug use marijuana use and alcohol use all significantly increase that risk if both care
providers are in the same bed with a child smoke and have had two or more drinks at risk of sudden
infant death goes up to 20 50 or more than 100 times depending on the study that you look at so
these are all good reasons to a avoid bed sharing if you can because it's really just a setup to be
a dangerous instance when are like you're in the same surface as your infant maybe you're sleeping
heavily maybe because you've been working hard or because you're just a parent of a new baby
and you're exhausted but then if you add things like drugs tobacco or alcohol to that it just
really increases the risk and so something that we strongly recommend you work to avoid they've got
like kind of surfaces next to like you can have the bassinet right next to the bed or
other things that try to hopefully help like your relationship with your child that you can still be
close and can help kind of foster some of those birth breastfeeding relationships keeping you
close making it easier to do that midnight cares but please please separate surfaces for their
safety and reducing the risk of sun and for death there's really good data that rates of sudden
infant death have really dropped precipitously in the 90s and early 2000s with having baby sleep on
on their backs on a flat surface that is all their own and so that's something that there's
good data to support that safe sleep practices make a big difference yes I think it would be
remiss not to say that sometimes bed sharing happens absolutely right like this is
there is there is what is perfect and safest and lowest risk in all of these things but then there
is also real life in being a new parent um and I there are recommendations from different not AAP
um organizations in terms of ways to make bed sharing as safe as possible and so which
I think is really important too in that like we understand that you are a human just as we were
human and still are human and there are times where you are exhausted and your baby is just
there and you may be tempted by that things that I would strongly recommend if that's something that
you end up in again avoiding alcohol avoiding substance use avoiding tobacco any blankets in
the bed should be far far away from the child this may mean that like you and partner are scrunched
way down to the bottom of the bed and baby is up above the pillow I mean I had I remember having a
girlfriend in residency who just like a couple nights baby just couldn't wasn't mom also was
about to lose it and so she would dress herself in sweatpants sweatshirts socks there were no
blankets on the bed there were no pillows on the bed she laid next to her baby in a queen size
bed with a baby in the middle far away on the firm surface because that was what she needed for Mom's
survival and so I think understanding that you may find yourself in that situation it is not ideal
read the things that make it safer to do that and try to limit it and make it as temporary as
possible but do it as safely as you can yep and again key things that Sarah said that I think
are good to point out like the bed if hopefully where they are is relatively firm like right in
soft mattresses that they roll over face down can be a difference make sure they're sleeping
on their backs and then no blankets pillows anything near them that could potentially get
in front of their face or no place that they could roll their face up to like the wall or
the headboard or something that could cause them to have a lot of re-breathing of what their the
air they're breathing out right so it's almost midnight I'm doing some last minute edits on this
for those of you who didn't know we like shoot and film all of our stuff and edit it all just
in a room in our house it used to be actually in our baby's nursery where we'd shoot these um but
I was watching some of this video and I realized that you know some of you who are watching this
may be in a spot where you feel like hey I just can't get my baby to sleep anywhere but next to me
I need something just to help us get some sleep how do I do this safely and maybe you were looking
for this video to give you some reassurance on that maybe you're limited in space or what other
reasons so we're going to try to link some resources about if you have to surface share
ways to make that as safe as possible of course we mentioned some of those avoiding alcohol or other
oasid substances during that that might impair you might cause you to sleep extra heavy and not
notice things but also want to as we said like try to keep the baby away from blankets but even like
looking through some of the American Academy of Pediatrics literature a quote from their document
that they say that was just put out in 2022 says parent infant bed sharing continues to be highly
controversial electrophysiologic and Behavioral Studies offer a strong case for its effect in
facilitating breastfeeding there are there is some physiologic evidence that bed sharing increases
infant calming and many parents believe that they can maintain vigilance of the infant while they
are asleep and bed sharing so if you were someone who believes strongly that the best place for
your baby to sleep is next to you in bed there's some evidence to support that you might have some
reason to believe that I think the flip side is that there definitely is a bit of a risk in bed
sharing too and so I think that's one of those things that you really need to weigh for yourself
and know like hey these are my limitations as parent this is what I really strongly believe that
my baby needs and if this is what my baby needs here's how I'm going to do that safely so that's
a spot that you're in you're here you're listening to our video this week please go check out some of
those resources just to see what can you do if you're going to surface share to make it safer
again the recommendation is that you not surface share that you stay in the same room for the first
six months of life but that you be on separate surfaces but if you absolutely must hopefully
are the resources we put below can help you out all right next question um comes from Rebecca
thoughts on Emma Lee oster's books expecting better in crib sheet love very interesting just
uh so Emily Oster is an economics professor who loves the data who loves data and thinking about
data in a very practical evidence-based way and so she goes through different topics and
expecting better about pregnancy so she talks you know breaks down a lot of the myths and thoughts
on different pregnancy topics you know coffee and pregnancy alcohol and pregnancy what else
um eating deli meat risks of Jelly Bean all the different studies on this you know and talks about
that information presents it in a very you know evidence-based way here's what I did so on and so
forth so it's just an interesting perspective to read some of the studies you may not be aware of
and how she puts it together so enjoyable read for sure other great pregnancy books um there
is the ACOG actually has a great kind of guide for pregnancy that often your OB will give you
at an OB appointment if not you can get it online but it's very goes kind of week by week things to
think about that's helpful and we actually use that for a lot of our resources when we went to
our initial first time through pregnancy week by week indeed there's a lot of great information yes
um you know the old book What to Expect When You're Expecting also kind of goes week by
week There's a much more updated and contemporary version that is done by motherly it's a website
Community kind of online called becoming mama and that is a wonderful also week by
week guide I was the medical editor for that and and wrote some things for that I think
it's also a wonderful resource for when you are going through your pregnancy um to have really
a really nice holistic approach to pregnancy and early motherhood and it seems like a great
resource from even a dad to look at yeah so yes so check those out okay guys thank you so much
for joining us we love your questions hopefully we'll get to more and more we'll see you next
Sunday for more questions and stay tuned for our regular Wednesday content have a great week bye
we're doctors but not your doctors anything we've said in this video
is for education or entertainment purposes only it is not medical
advice any specific medical questions you have should be directed to your provider