By Barbara Carmen
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
Advocates for EDUCATION, PREVENTION
Ohio may track shaken-baby crimes
Tuesday, April 17, 2007 3:27 AM
Ohio could become the first state in the nation to track the number of children killed or injured by being shaken.
The state, under a bill to be introduced today, also would join a growing list of others that mandate education about the dangers of shaking a child for new parents and child-care providers.
"Shaking a baby leaves a devastating impact," said Sen. Steve Stivers, an Upper Arlington Republican. "And there is not an adequate tracking system."
A shaken-baby education bill sponsored by another lawmaker died in 2003 from lack of support. Hospitals, for example, feared being sued if they missed educating a parent whose baby was later shaken.
This time, Stivers thinks he's smoothed concerns.
"We're supportive, but we're monitoring it," said Jeff Klingler, director of state policy and advocacy for the Ohio Hospital Association.
"What's different about this bill is that it creates a group of experts to come up with the information and it puts it on the Web, so it's available for all hospitals."
The proposed Shaken Baby Syndrome Education Program also is being monitored by child-abuse prevention advocates. They, however, are hoping for changes.
Advocates want the bill to require face-to-face instruction by hospital employees, and not just printed handouts. And they say radio and television spots are needed to reach young men and child-care providers, the two groups statistically most likely to shake a baby.
"Shaken-baby syndrome is 100 percent preventable," said Lisa Carroll, a nurse who helped start education programs in maternity wards and pushed for a law.
Shaking stops crying, but whips a baby's soft brain against the skull. Babies who survive it face a lifetime of physical, educational and behavioral problems.
At a news conference yesterday at the Center for Child and Family Advocacy at Children's Hospital, Janet Cross smiled through tears and held a photograph of her son and a pair of tiny baby shoes.
Joshua Cross was 10 months old when he died after being shaken by his baby sitter in August 1999.
Mrs. Cross, of the South Side, and other advocates cited Dispatch stories about a lack of statewide data as a catalyst for launching a new bill. Each time a baby is shaken in Ohio, Mrs. Cross clips the newspaper story and pastes it in a notebook. She now has stacks.
Stivers said his bill "would make Ohio a model for the nation."
"I think it has room to grow," said parent and nurse Sharon Snyder of the West Side. She wants more education for doctors and nurses because her daughter's injuries were missed twice.
Charlotte, 5, cannot speak, roll over, hug or eat. She has a small pink wheelchair and $15,000 in medical bills a month. Her parents, who adopted her after she was injured by her biological parents, take her to local high schools as a warning to students to never shake a baby.
"We believe education works," her adopted father, Columbus Police Officer Brent Snyder told Stivers. "We believe it so much that we do it."
bcarmen@dispatch.com
http://www.dispatch.com/dispatch/content/local_news/stories/2007/04/17/shakebaby.ART_ART_04-17-07_D3_S16DIIQ.html?print=yes
