Coping with Infant Sleep Disorders

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Saturday, May 16th, 2009 Subscribe To Our Feed

Sadly, sleep disorders can plague babies as well as adults. There are many types of infant sleep disorders, however a physician is often the only person who can properly diagnose them.

Children have irregular sleep patterns because of their need to eat regularly. There are some sleep disorders that are learned behavior instead of a legitimate disease. You can help your child to overcome these problems without medication by changing their environment and gently teaching them to improve their sleeping habits.

Children often go through periods of having nightmares as they get older. Sleep terrors or night terrors are other forms of sleep disorders. The child usually outgrows these forms of sleep disorders.

A child who stops breathing for short periods of time in their sleep is known as sleep apnea. This type of sleep disorder is diagnosed most in premature babies. In fact, it is a proven fact that a premature baby is more likely to have sleep apnea than a baby that is born at full term.

Usually, you have to rub the baby’s back or nudge them and they will start breathing on their own again. In rare cases, infant CPR is needed to revive the baby. When a parent brings back an infant with sleep apnea, it is usually very scary. The fear of their child stopping breathing in the middle of the night can cause any parent to sit up all night beside the crib.

Before the parent can bring their baby home from hospital, the hospital will require them to attend an infant CPR course.

When the baby is released, it is usually with a piece of machinery called an apnea monitor. The baby’s breathing is monitored with electrodes attached to the baby’s chest. As soon as abnormal breathing patterns are detected, the monitor will alert you.

If the baby’s breathing is too shallow or stops altogether, the monitor will sound a loud high-pitched alarm to alert you of the danger. Any parent who has experienced this sound, especially in the middle of the night, will tell you it’s heart stopping. The baby needs to be attached to the monitor all of the time he or she is sleeping. During waking hours, it is not necessary to use the monitor.

Medical personnel will go to your home and take readings from the monitor to make sure that it is working properly and also that it is being used properly. They will then forward a report to your baby’s pediatrician for him or her to monitor. It’s up to the pediatrician to determine if the monitor is still needed or not. Your baby’s progress will be discussed before any decisions are made.

Quinton van Oudtshoorn

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