None listed
Conditions
Brief summary
In New Zealand Sudden Unexpected Death (SUDI) in Infancy is the leading cause of death for infants one month to one year of age. The Counties Manukau Health Board area in South Auckland unfortunately has the highest rate of SUDI deaths in New Zealand. It is very clear, from local and international epidemiological data, that SUDI risk can be reduced by modifying the behaviours that contribute to risk. The Safe sleep calculator (SSC) has been developed, from five large international (including the NZ Cot Death Study) case control studies, to make an accurate assessment of Sudden Unexpected Death in Infancy risk for an individual baby, and provide clear information about how caregivers can improve safety for their infants by modifying behaviours. We intend to pilot the SSC with the South Auckland Midwives over December 2015-February 2016. Midwives will be invited to be involved in the study. They will have sign in access to the online SSC which they will be encouraged to use in routine care of mothers and infants in the postnatal period. Midwives will invite mothers/caregivers to be involved in the study and contact details of consenting mothers/caregivers will provided to the research team to enable follow up. After a period of one month midwives will be interviewed to gather their perspectives on the acceptability and usefulness of the SSC. This information will be used to modify the SSC and to optimise it for midwifery use. The impact of the SSC will be measured by repeated use of the SSC. The second SSC assessment will be done by the research team by telephone interview of the infants mother/caregiver 2-4 weeks after the initial SSC was performed by the midwife. Comparison will be made of modifiable behaviours over time. This pilot is part of a wider New Zealand research programme to implement the SSC into midwifery, Well Child Providers (early childhood nurses) and General Practice. The goal is to improve the identification and awareness of SUDI risk for infants by healthcare workers and thereby produce consistency of advice around modifiable behaviours to improve infant sleep safety.
Interventions
The Safe Sleep Calculator (SSC) is an online tool that has been developed by Prof. Edwin Mitchell using the risk algorithm developed by Bob Carpenter which has been based on the five large international Sudden infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) case control studies.
From December 2015 through January 2016 up to thirty South Auckland midwives will be invited to volunteer to incorporate the SSC as their method of SUDI risk assessment into routine post-natal care.
Midwives will request consent from
The Safe Sleep Calculator (SSC) is an online tool that has been developed by Prof. Edwin Mitchell using the risk algorithm developed by Bob Carpenter which has been based on the five large international Sudden infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) case control studies. From December 2015 through January 2016 up to thirty South Auckland midwives will be invited to volunteer to incorporate the SSC as their method of SUDI risk assessment into routine post-natal care. Midwives will request consent from the parent to use the SSC, to assess SUDI risk, in the the post-natal period from birth up until discharge from midwifery care at 4-6 weeks old preferably once the baby is in the home . This involves asking the mother/parent questions related to SUDI risk for example; baby's birth weight, mothers smoking status and the place and position where baby sleeps. The SSC tool brings all the routine care questions to evaluate SUDI risk into one online tool and once entered provides a risk assessment for that individual infant expressed as rate per 1000 and 1 per xx number of infants. The SSC shows what the modifiable risks are for that infant and shows what the effect will be on the risk on their SUDI risk if the modification is made to behaviour. Midwives already have in place the ability to refer families for safe sleep devices (bassinets pepi-pod and wahakura (maaori flax woven baby bed) and written information on safe sleep is already current standard midwifery care. Midwives will request permission to forward contact details of all infants who have a SSC to the research group. After a period of one month of use, qualitative interviewing of the midwives will be performed, to obtain feedback to refine the SSC for midwifery use. Each use of the SSC uses contributes data to non-identifiable (encoded national health index number) data sheet maintained by the SSC researchers. The impact of the SSC on risk will be measured by the research group by repeat measure of the SSC. This will by done by phone interview of infant caregivers 2-4 weeks after the initial Safe Sleep Calculation by the midwife. This study is a 10 week pilot study however it is anticipated that if the SSC is useful and is effective in its current form it will then become generally available to midwives for routine care.
Sponsors
Counties Manukau District Health Board
Study design
Allocation
Non-randomised trial
Intervention model
Single group
Primary purpose
Educational / counselling / training
Masking
Open (masking not used)
Eligibility
Sex/Gender
All
Age
13 Years to No maximum
Healthy volunteers
Yes
Inclusion criteria
Lead Maternity Care (LMC) midwives and Community midwives in South Auckland will be contacted and invited to be involved in the pilot of the SSC. The study population will be mothers living in the Counties Manukau Health Board area giving birth to a full term live infant in the Counties Manukau Health Board region between December 2015 and February 2016.
Exclusion criteria
Mothers and their infants will be ineligible if there is a past maternal history of SUDI, the infant dies, remains in hospital or exceeds the study age cut off before contact has been made.
Outcome results
None listed