Safe sleep
Safer Sleeping 2025/26:
The past year has seen the development of a multi-agency communication campaign to promote understanding of Safer Sleeping practices for babies and infants. We note from the learning we take from our Child Death Overview Panel that Sudden Unexpected Deaths of Infants (SUDI) are preventable and there are often several modifiable factors which are illustrated in the graphic below. These factors will be a clear focus of multi-agency professionals but in particular health visitors and community midwifery teams.
2025/26 will see us launch, embed and monitor our innovative safer sleep alert notification system. This system will see Police partners bring to the attention of health visitors concerns they hold upon unsafe sleep arrangements when they attend properties, and these cases will be appropriately triaged. We will launch this scheme, embed it and monitor the impact it is making.
We have now launched our Safer Sleeping hub on the Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust website. The new hub draws in information and advice from the Lullaby Trust and parents and carers will also be able to hear directly from midwives’ tips and suggestions to keep their babies and infants safe when sleeping. You can find it here https://www.royalfree.nhs.uk/services/maternity-services/postnatal-care#safersleeping
Safer Sleeping week March 10th - 16th 2025:
Over the course of 10th - 16th March BSCP marked Safer Sleeping week by a number of activities. Our colleagues at the Whittington NHS Health Trust were out and about in the community at our local children’s centres sharing critical awareness information from the Lullaby Trust on Safer Sleeping. Colleagues were also out leafleting our communities and talking to local residents upon the importance of ensuring that babies and infants sleeping arrangements are safe. The local community board, on behalf of Whittington NHS Health Trust heard from experts upon Safer Sleeping too. Finally, our special BSCP webinar upon Safer Sleeping (on our Learning Repository page) of this website was hosted full of expert insights, tips and advice upon Safer Sleeping. Colleagues in attendance heard about our new safer sleep child alert notification system, which will allow police to send concerns to local health visitors that a family may need support to improve the sleeping arrangements for their children. See all the pictures and info here from Safer Sleep week
Our thanks to all who participated in Safer Sleep week 2025
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
If a child is in immediate danger please call 999
The below information is from The Lullaby Trust, and you can visit their website for more advice.
What it is
Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) is the sudden and unexplained death of a baby where no cause is found. While SIDS is rare, it can still happen and there are steps parents can take to help reduce the chance of this tragedy occurring. There are some things you can do and not do to ensure that this doesn't occur.
Things you can do
- Always place your baby on their back to sleep
- Keep your baby smoke free during pregnancy and after birth
- Place your baby to sleep in a separate cot or Moses basket in the same room as you for the first 6 months
- Breastfeed your baby
- Use a firm, flat, waterproof mattress in good condition
Things to avoid
- Never sleep on a sofa or in an armchair with your baby
- Don’t sleep in the same bed as your baby if you smoke, drink or take drugs or are extremely tired, if your baby was born prematurely or was of low birth-weight
- Avoid letting your baby get too hot
- Don’t cover your baby’s face or head while sleeping or use loose bedding.
You can also see this information leaflet from the Lullaby Trust.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
BSCP also notes, and has built into wider public health campaigns, the importance of ensuring babies are safe in slings. We note a 2025 coroner's inquest a Prevention of Future Deaths Report from the West London Coroner's court following the sad death of James Alderman. Here, the coroner identifed that James was 6 weeks and 6 days old at the time he died, and apart from a light cold was physically well. He was being breast fed hands free within a baby carrier/sling, being worn by his mother while she moved around the home. It was accepted that the sling was being worn snugly, not tightly, and although she could see his face when she looked down, the TICKS acronym was not met by his position within the sling as James was too far down.
The TICKS acronym was prepared by the (now disbanded) UK consortium of sling retailers and manufacturers
Tight
In view at all times
Close enough to kiss
Keep chin off the chest
Supported back
Following the Coroner's inquest the NCT have updated their guidance on use of slings and we encourage all parents to read it here Baby slings and carriers: a guide | NCT