Preventing sudden infant deaths--the slow diffusion of an idea

Seven mistakes and potential solutions in epidemiology, including a call for a World Council of Epidemiology and Causality

All sciences make mistakes, and epidemiology is no exception. I have chosen 7 illustrative mistakes and derived 7 solutions to avoid them. The mistakes (Roman numerals denoting solutions) are:

1. Failing to provide the context and definitions of study populations. (I Describe the study population in detail)

2. Insufficient attention to evaluation of error. (II Don't pretend error does not exist.)

3. Not demonstrating comparisons are like-for-like. (III Start with detailed comparisons of groups.)

4. Either overstatement or understatement of the case for causality. (IV Never say this design cannot contribute to causality or imply causality is ensured by your design.)

5. Not providing both absolute and relative summary measures. (V Give numbers, rates and comparative measures, and adjust summary measures such as odds ratios appropriately.)

6. In intervention studies not demonstrating general health benefits. (VI Ensure general benefits (mortality/morbidity) before recommending application of cause-specific findings.)

7. Failure to utilise study data to benefit populations. (VII Establish a World Council on Epidemiology to help infer causality from associations and apply the work internationally.)

Analysis of these and other common mistakes is needed to benefit from the increasing discovery of associations that will be multiplying as data mining, linkage, and large-scale scale epidemiology become commonplace.

Strategies for promoting organizational and practice change by advancing implementation research

BACKGROUND

The persistence of a large quality gap between what we know about how to produce high quality clinical care and what the public receives has prompted interest in developing more effective methods to get evidence into practice. Implementation research aims to supply such methods.

PURPOSE

This article proposes a set of recommendations aimed at establishing a common understanding of what implementation research is, and how to foster its development.

METHODS

We developed the recommendations in the context of a translation research conference hosted by the VA for VA and non-VA health services researchers.

IMPACTS

Health care organizations, journals, researchers and academic institutions can use these recommendations to advance the field of implementation science and thus increase the impact of clinical and health services research on the health and health care of the public.

Pathways to "evidence-informed" policy and practice: a framework for action

Bowen and Zwi propose a new framework that can help researchers and policy makers to navigate the use of evidence.

Infant sleeping position and the sudden infant death syndrome: systematic review of observational studies and historical review of recommendations from 1940 to 2002

BACKGROUND

Before the early 1990s, parents were advised to place infants to sleep on their front contrary to evidence from clinical research.

METHODS

We systematically reviewed associations between infant sleeping positions and sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), explored sources of heterogeneity, and compared findings with published recommendations.

RESULTS

By 1970, there was a statistically significantly increased risk of SIDS for front sleeping compared with back (pooled odds ratio (OR) 2.93; 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.15, 7.47), and by 1986, for front compared with other positions (five studies, pooled OR 3.00; 1.69-5.31). The OR for front vs the back position was reduced as the prevalence of the front position in controls increased. The pooled OR for studies conducted before advice changed to avoid front sleeping was 2.95 (95% CI 1.69-5.15), and after was 6.91 (4.63-10.32). Sleeping on the front was recommended in books between 1943 and 1988 based on extrapolation from untested theory.

CONCLUSIONS

Advice to put infants to sleep on the front for nearly a half century was contrary to evidence available from 1970 that this was likely to be harmful. Systematic review of preventable risk factors for SIDS from 1970 would have led to earlier recognition of the risks of sleeping on the front and might have prevented over 10 000 infant deaths in the UK and at least 50 000 in Europe, the USA, and Australasia. Attenuation of the observed harm with increased adoption of the front position probably reflects a "healthy adopter" phenomenon in that families at low risk of SIDS were more likely to adhere to prevailing health advice. This phenomenon is likely to be a general problem in the use of observational studies for assessing the safety of health promotion.

Suffocated prone: the iatrogenic tragedy of SIDS

Epidemiologic research has shown that prone sleeping is a major risk factor for sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS). In a public health review from Sweden, we explored the historical background of the SIDS epidemic, starting with the view of the Catholic Church that sudden infant deaths were infanticides and ending with the slowly disseminated recommendation of a prone sleeping position during the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s. The story of the SIDS epidemic illustrates a pitfall of preventive medicine--the translation of health care routines for patients to general health advice that targets the whole population. False advice, as well as correct advice, may have a profound effect on public health because of the many individuals concerned. Preventive measures must be based on scientific evidence, and systematic supervision and evaluations are necessary to identify the benefits or the harm of the measures. The discovery of the link between prone sleeping and SIDS has been called a success story for epidemiology, but the slow acceptance of the causal relationship between prone sleeping and SIDS illustrates the weak position of epidemiology and public health within the health care system.

Neonatal and postneonatal mortality in Germany since unification

BACKGROUND

After unification, the gap in infant mortality rates between the two parts of Germany widened until 1996 before converging. The reasons for these changes have not, so far, been apparent.

OBJECTIVES

To investigate trends in neonatal and postneonatal mortality in the eastern (the new Länder) and western (the old Länder) part of Germany after unification in 1990 and to identify the scope for further improvement.

DESIGN

Examination of trends in birth weights, birth weight specific neonatal mortality and cause specific postneonatal mortality in the two parts of Germany from 1990 to 1996 and 1997 by analysing routinely available vital statistics data.

RESULTS

In both parts of Germany, neonatal mortality fell considerably, by 33 per cent in the east and 17 per cent in the west, from 4.5 and 3.5 per thousand live births in 1990 to 3.0 and 2.9 in 1997, respectively. This was attributable to an improvement in survival of infants at all birth weights but especially among those with very low birth weights, accounting for an estimated 83 to 85 per cent of the overall improvement. The birth weight distribution showed a slight worsening in the new and the old Länder with an increase in the proportion of those under 1500 g and, in the east, a 24 per cent increase in the proportion of high birth-weight infants of 4000 and more grams. Trends in postneonatal mortality revealed a worsening of about 32 per cent in the east from 1990 to 1991 followed by a decline of over 50 per cent up to 1997, leading to comparable mortality rates of 1.8 per thousand live births in the east and 2.0 in the west. While both parts experienced a decrease of 40 to 48 per cent in deaths from all diseases, the decline in deaths because of accidents and injuries was markedly higher in the new Länder although they are still exceeding the western rate by 3.7 per 100,000 live births in 1997.

CONCLUSIONS

Since unification, the two parts of Germany underwent a complex process that has led finally to convergence of parameters of infant health that are most likely to have been because of improvements in the quality of perinatal care. To improve infant mortality in Germany, policy measures should focus on preventive rather than curative measures as the proportion of very low birthweight babies is increasing in both parts of Germany.