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A journey into the shaken baby syndrome/abusive head trauma controversy

cambridgeblog.org

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Re: A journey into the shaken baby syndrome/abusive head trauma controversy

#381

Post by bluGill »

jollyllama wrote: post #357
itsmemattchung wrote: post #16

> As a precautionary measure, the hospital followed mandatory reporting statutes and my wife and I temporarily lost custody of David. Thanks to our incredibly effective defense lawyer, we were cleared of all charges within two months, during which we stayed at the hospital 24/7 with David until we sorted out the legal procedures. Holy shit. Parents bring baby to ER ... results reveal that baby was shaken (article lat…

What's the outcome for the kid? Can the system even do much to help with the child's medical condition? If not, it's irrational for people to take their children in for examination; there's no benefit and you risk being accused.

Parents only know symptoms, which could be anything. Those same symptoms (or small variations) can lead to a very different diagnosis which is easily treatable.

Re: A journey into the shaken baby syndrome/abusive head trauma controversy

#382

Post by Dah00n »

sandworm101 wrote: post #345

>> how many people are in jail or lost their kids due to something that didn't actually happen. Thousands upon thousands. By some estimates upwards of 10% of incarcerated individuals. The situation is just accepted. The general consensus is always that locking up too many people is better than than too few. It is on defense attorneys to check on the system.

Not everywhere is the US.

Re: A journey into the shaken baby syndrome/abusive head trauma controversy

#383

Post by raducu »

mike_hock wrote: post #316
raducu wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It could be, but communication issues could also be at play, plus overeager doctors/social workers. In Romania they go at great lengths not to pull children out of family environments, in Denmark and other more developed countries it could be the opposite.

Implying ripping children out of their families willy-nilly is "more developed."

I'm not implying anything other than the fact in Romania social workers KNOW it's very, very likely the child will fare worse fate in an orphanage or foster care, EVEN in cases that would be considered abuse in the West.

Given a more developed country, I'd presume there are more people willing to adopt/do foster care for the right reasons and the social workers can regularly check upon the welfare of the child, thus there can be legitimate reasons to lower the threshold of taking a child out of a family setting vs a less developed country.

Re: A journey into the shaken baby syndrome/abusive head trauma controversy

#384

Post by sanderjd »

cdogl wrote: post #204
sanderjd wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah I dunno... I mean, a lot of these things are true, and they all are big problems, but also, in my experience, academics (at least in the sciences) do actually know how to read and understand research, which is an extremely difficult and useful skill.

Many academics have these skills; whether the higher education system is effective at teaching them and delivers an experience worth the significant cost to students (or here in Australia, also the publics).

I would argue that it's clearly the most effective system at training people to do this. It's fine to imagine (and try to create) alternative systems that would work better. But there isn't one now.

Constructive criticism is good. But what I mostly see (and often do myself) is just grousing.

Re: A journey into the shaken baby syndrome/abusive head trauma controversy

#385

Post by xyzzy_plugh »

Fire-Dragon-DoL wrote: post #256
fnordpiglet wrote: post #217

This article reminded me of another local story about a doctor who provides assessment beyond the knee jerk child protection industrial complex - https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/child-abuse-or-med... This also reminds me a lot of the indoctrination we went through at the hospital when my daughter was born. Despite being a high risk pregnancy we were railroaded into a natural birth. After nearly 24 hours of…

I didn't know that about sids. What a bullshit diagnosis. Our children mostly slept tummy down on mum's chest, skin-to-skin, because that reduced sids chance (and we were terrified). But like yours, they couldn't sleep tummy up

AIUI tummy down on a (wakeful) person is generally not a concern nor what the "back is best" crowd is referring to

Obviously a parent who is spending nearly all their time with a newborn knows them best and is likely able to make the best judgement about what works for the child, but the purpose of the advice is to avoid a class of scenario that occur most often. due to issues that are very difficult to detect and often go completely undiagnosed, as they pertain to early development and often improve naturally over time.

The technical report by AAP the other year does an excellent job of presenting the current evidence in an as objective way as possible, I highly recommend it:

https://publications.aap.org/pediatrics/article/150/1/e20220...

You will note that efforts are being made to disentangle diagnoses from the broad SIDS label and that while SIDS cases are trending downwards, it's likely due to both proper classification and education.

The point of preventative measures is to avoid the issue entirely. Sure, tummy sleeping might not be a problem for you (or maybe it was and you just got lucky!) but by generally recommending back sleeping, a class of issues is avoided.

So all in all, I really don't see this as bullshit at all. Caveat that you gotta do what you gotta do, but I'd rather this advice persist than not. We should hope that no one ever has to endure the loss of a child.

Re: A journey into the shaken baby syndrome/abusive head trauma controversy

#386

Post by pyrale »

raducu wrote: post #226
Muromec wrote: post #215

Oh the good old, violent Easter European bias mixed into crap science.

It could be, but communication issues could also be at play, plus overeager doctors/social workers. In Romania they go at great lengths not to pull children out of family environments, in Denmark and other more developed countries it could be the opposite.

> in Denmark and other more developed countries it could be the opposite.

Did you mean: richer?

Re: A journey into the shaken baby syndrome/abusive head trauma controversy

#387

Post by sanderjd »

j16sdiz wrote: post #57
sanderjd wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah I dunno... I mean, a lot of these things are true, and they all are big problems, but also, in my experience, academics (at least in the sciences) do actually know how to read and understand research, which is an extremely difficult and useful skill.

Isn't that just what PhD do? I meant going through piles of papers - most of them bring more new questions than answers - and stay sane

Yep. That's exactly what I'm saying. This is like the primary skill that people learn to get a PhD. It's true that people can learn it without getting a PhD, but hardly anyone does, because it kind of sucks and if you're doing it you may as well do it with the guidance of an advisor and get a credential at the end.

Re: A journey into the shaken baby syndrome/abusive head trauma controversy

#388

Post by J_Shelby_J »

Dove wrote: post #353

> What happened is that during my literature review, I disturbingly realized that what I had been told at the hospital ... was an assertion based on very weak scientific foundations. And yet ... has been taught as though it was a proven fact to generations of physicians all over the world. This exact thing has happened to me so many times, on so many different medical topics, that it is now my going in assumption tha…

> The prospect of cybersecurity professionals taking years to apply a patch after a security flaw is discovered beggars belief.

Not just years, but generations in some cases.

Re: A journey into the shaken baby syndrome/abusive head trauma controversy

#389

Post by AbrahamParangi »

amluto wrote: post #306
seszett wrote: post #286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I remember one classic one is the "no coffee when pregnant", the study says this causes problems, the test was performed on rats and by feeding them coffee in the amount of 3/4 of their body weight. We can agree that with this amount, it's reasonable it could cause problems. Very different from one cup of coffee though. Honestly I don't know which study you're talking about, and I'm not trying to question what you'…

SIDS has all manner of interesting and unexpected demographic correlations. I’m not convinced anyone knows what to make of them.

The covariates are awkward and because they correspond so strongly with parental traits, the possibility exists that the kids are dying because of dysfunctional parental behaviors specifically.

Re: A journey into the shaken baby syndrome/abusive head trauma controversy

#390

Post by raducu »

bluGill wrote: post #360
mike_hock wrote: post #316

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Implying ripping children out of their families willy-nilly is "more developed."

Not ripping children from actually abusive families is more developed. There are many cases of abuses families who need to lose their children, and in some those families still have children. There are other cases where good families lose their children. Note that I carefully did not say anything about what abuse is. Unfortunately there is no agreement and I don't want to get into that debate (it is well worth having…

There are debatable issues, and clear cut issues -- not providing basic care or medical care is quite clear cut.

Homeschooling is debatable, if the children are evaluated to be equal to their regular schooled peers, I don't think the child should be taken out of the family environment, but should be subject to further wellness checks by social workers.

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