Shaken Baby Syndrome Research Paper

Never Shake A Baby
Shaken Baby Syndrome or abusive head trauma is a serious and potentially life threatening condition in children that results from being violently shaken. As identified in class, some symptoms of Shaken Baby Syndrome are seizures, decreased alertness, extreme irritability or change in behavior, loss of consciousness, loss of vision, poor feeding, vomiting or having trouble breathing. When diagnosing abusive head trauma, physicians specifically look for three symptoms in particular that have come to be known as ‘the triad.’ The triad includes unexplained bleeding in the brain, unexplained brain swelling, and unexplained bleeding behind the retina. The effects of SBS can be life long or even fatal.
However, even with all the
research that has been done on abusive head trauma, there is no way to effectively and ethically test the triad of symptoms. The fact that the way doctors diagnose Shaken Baby Syndrome relies heavily on the triad and other symptoms associated with it, continues to lead to controversy in the medical world.
The triad cannot be tested directly, which has lead to misdiagnoses and false accusations because of the fact that the symptoms included in the triad could appear because of a completely different reason or condition. There is much evidence to support it, but the fact remains that one cannot one hundred percent confirm that a child has Shaken Baby Syndrome solely based on the triad.
In the article Doctors Devise A Better Way To Diagnose Shaken Baby Syndrome, Tara Haelle discusses the new process some doctors are using to try to diagnose Shaken Baby Syndrome more precisely. The new approach is simple; doctors recognize a certain list of symptoms that are related to abusive head trauma, and “the more of those a child
suffers, the more likely the case resulted from abuse (Haelle, New England Public Radio, July 29, 2015).” When testing this method, researchers looked for a standard of three or more of the six symptoms identified. However, when this process of diagnosis was tested, it was found that it did not cover everything. Research proved that “the method correctly identified 82 percent of 133 cases as not abusive. It also correctly found that two-thirds of the other 66 children had suffered abusive head trauma, though it missed 13 cases of abuse in which the child had few of the physical symptoms used by the tool. Twelve cases mistaken for abuse involved substantial injuries from a car accident or other situations (Haelle, New England Public Radio, July 29, 2015).” Therefore, one can argue that this method needs improvement because some cases were mistaken for abuse, and other cases of abuse were not correctly identified. Perhaps more specific symptoms or more symptoms in general could be used to analyze Shaken Baby Syndrome, because there is also evidence that certain rare diseases have similar symptoms to those associated with Shaken Baby Syndrome according to some physicians. Overall, Doctors Devise A Better Way To Diagnose Shaken Baby Syndrome gave an interesting view of abusive head trauma, and even though the new diagnosis technique was not perfectly effective, it shows potential and advancement in research on Shaken Baby Syndrome.
The article Shaken Baby Syndrome: A Diagnosis That Divides the Medical World, examines the trial of Louise Woodward, which took place in Massachusetts in 1997.
Woodward worked as an au pair to a baby boy named Michael, and when he suddenly stopped breathing one day she rushed him to the hospital. Later, when he died from what was diagnosed as Shaken Baby Syndrome, Woodward ended up being accused of violently shaking him and causing his injuries. This article focuses on the fact that there was so much emphasis placed on the Shaken Baby Syndrome triad of symptoms in this trial, and the overall divide in the medical world on the topic of abusive head trauma. Dr. Patrick Barnes, who testified in 1997, reveals that Woodward’s trial made him rethink what he knew about abusive head trauma. Dr. Barnes says that during the trial he “was adamant that it had to be child abuse, shaken baby syndrome (Haberman, The New York Times, September 13, 2015).” However, Barnes mentions that when the trial ended he began to rethink his stance, and that he, “is now convinced that the diagnosis has been invoked too readily in criminal cases and that other causes might explain any bleeding and brain swelling (Haberman, The New York Times, September 13, 2015).” It is clear that there could have been other causes for Michael’s injuries other than Shaken Baby Syndrome. The medical world seems to be divided in the way that some experts are convinced the triad of symptoms of Shaken Baby Syndrome can appear
without the child bring violently shaken, and those who believe that the triad points directly to abusive head trauma.
In Education Key in Preventing Shaken Baby Syndrome, Gerry J. Gilmore explains the dangers of Shaken Baby Syndrome and how to prevent new cases from popping up. As for abusive head trauma prevention, the article mentions that “mothers who deliver their babies at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Md., receive a series of mandatory briefings (Gilmore, U.S. Department of Defense, April 17, 2007).” It is stated that these briefings can happen at different times in the baby’s life, some of which have proven to be more affective on their parents. Also, the importance of informing fathers of the dangers of shaking a child are highlighted because, “about 70 percent of shaken-baby cases are committed by fathers or other males (Gilmore, U.S. Department of Defense, April 17, 2007).” Overall Education Key in Preventing Shaken Baby Syndrome was eye-opening because the simple act of informing someone of the dangers of shaking a child can have a huge impact on the number future abusive head trauma cases.