The National Center for Fatality Review and Prevention (National Center), housed within MPHI’s Center for National Prevention Initiatives (CNPI), published an article in Pediatrics. Pediatrics is an official peer-reviewed journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics. The journal is ranked in the top 100 most-cited journals in science and medicine. Four MPHI employees worked to develop the article, titled “Improving Consistency in Classifying Child Maltreatment for Sudden Unexpected Infant Deaths.” These MPHI employees are Dr. Patti Schnitzer (Data Systems Consultant), Sasha Mintz, MPH (Senior Epidemiologist), Esther Shaw, MSIS (Senior Data Analyst), and Dr. Abby Collier (Director). Part of the National Center’s mission includes developing the National Fatality Review-Case Reporting System (NFR-CRS). This system is used by child death review (CDR) teams in the US to classify and document the deaths reviewed, which then serves to inform the development of prevention strategies, determine legal culpability, redirect blame from caregivers, or substantiate child maltreatment (CM).

The National Center’s goal with this article was to develop guidelines for CDR teams to improve consistency in CM and distinguish between exposure to hazards and neglect for sleep-related sudden unexpected infant deaths (SUID). To accomplish this goal, cases of sleep-related SUID between the years of 2004 and 2018 were identified through the NFR-CRS. These cases were then analyzed for associations between multiple variables, including exposure to hazards, neglect, CM, sleep environment hazards, supervisor impairment, and child welfare action.