What Is SBS?

Babies bring a lot of joy, but there can also be moments of frustration if you feel like you can’t console their crying. Most caregivers handle those times just fine. But if those feelings boil over, it can cross a line.

Shaken baby syndrome is a form of child abuse. When a baby is shaken hard by the shoulders, arms, or legs, it can cause learning disabilities, behavior disorders, vision problems or blindness, hearing and speech issues, seizures, cerebral palsy, serious brain injury, and permanent disability. In some cases, it can even be fatal.

Causes

Ever notice how long it takes babies to hold their heads up? Their neck muscles start out weak and get stronger as they grow. The same goes for their brains, which still need time to develop.

When a baby is shaken, its brain can bounce between the front and back of its skull. This causes it to bleed, bruise, and swell. It only takes a few seconds of aggressive shaking for this to happen.

What It’s Not

Shaken baby syndrome is different from gently tossing a baby playfully into the air or bouncing a baby on your knee. Though their brains and necks are fragile, babies are also unlikely to get shaken injuries by falling off furniture or making sudden stops in a car.

Symptoms

Being shaken affects babies in many different ways. Symptoms include vomiting, bluish skin, tremors or shakes, breathing issues, and drowsiness. Babies may also become less interested in eating; have trouble sucking, and stop smiling and talking.

You may notice bruises on the arms or chest in the places the baby has been grabbed. Other physical signs include a larger than usual head or forehead, different-sized pupils, not being able to focus, and favoring one arm or leg over another.

Babies with shaken baby syndrome may also have symptoms you can’t see, such as fractured ribs or other bones, spinal cord or neck injury, and bleeding in the brain. In mild cases, behavior, health, or learning issues show up later on.

Diagnosis

Because shaken baby syndrome can affect so many different parts of a child’s health, there may be more than one doctor or specialist involved in the diagnosis. Depending on the child’s level of injury, the tests may be done in doctor’s offices or a pediatric intensive care unit

To check the brain, doctors may use computerized tomography, or a CT scan, to X-ray for injuries that need immediate attention. Radio waves and magnetic fields in the form of magnetic resonance imaging, or MRI, also show doctors detailed areas of the brain.

X-rays of other body parts, like the arms, legs, spine, and skull, show fractures and whether they were created by force or accident.

To check for eye injuries and bleeding, doctors may do an eye exam.

Some disorders can mimic the symptoms of shaken baby syndrome. To rule those out, doctors may order blood tests.

Treatment and Prevention

Treatment for shaken baby syndrome depends on the injury. Surgery may be needed in an emergency. Some children will need care for the rest of their lives.

Shaken baby syndrome is 100% preventable. It starts with making sure all the baby’s caregivers — parents, grandparents, baby sitters, nannies, etc. — understand two things:

1. The dangers of shaking a baby, even for a few seconds.
2. Those babies cry a lot at first. The National Center for shaken baby syndrome calls it PURPLE crying:

• Peak pattern: At 2-3 months old, babies cry the most.
• Unpredictable: Crying starts and stops without reason.
• Resistant to soothing: Nothing stops the crying.
• Pain-like look on face: When babies cry, they look like they’re in pain, even if they’re not.
• Long bouts of crying: Babies can cry for hours at a time.
• Evening crying: Some babies cry more in the afternoon and evening.

Sometimes you can stop the crying by rubbing the baby’s back, singing, using “white noise” from an app or the sound of running water, taking a walk, or using a pacifier. Sometimes nothing seems to work. That’s when you especially need to manage your feelings.

Scott Juceam is one of the leading advocates against Shaken Baby Syndrome. Scott’s life changed when his daughter Hannah was shaken to death by her nanny in 2006. Since then, Scott has dedicated his life to preventing Shaken Baby Syndrome and child abuse.

To learn more about me, please visit my website at www.ScottJuceam.com or you can click here.