The New York Daily News reports that, according to an editorial report appearing in The BMJ, wearable products such as “smart baby monitors” will not protect infants from Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. While parents may learn to depend on the devices, “they shouldn’t do so, argues David King, a clinical lecturer in pediatrics at the University of Sheffield in England. These are consumer, not medical, devices that don’t require FDA approval or research that backs up their promises.” Additionally, the monitors are “not recommended by the American Academy of Pediatrics as a way to reduce SIDS risk.”
NPR reports in its “Shots” blog that, according to King, there is “no research to suggest that the information provided by these new devices provides a reliable indicator of danger, or indeed any reliable information about your child. ‘It’s not a medical device; it’s not registered as a medical device. It’s just for fun, really,’ King told Shots. ‘But if you look at the marketing so far, I don’t think that’s the message that comes across.’”
TIME reports King said the devices are helpful for some things such as monitoring “preterm infants or infants who need oxygen.” However, “in these cases parents and other caregivers should be trained in observation techniques, operation of the monitor, and infant cardiopulmonary resuscitation.”
From the news release of the American Association for Justice.
