A study in the October issue of Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine may offer a solution for sudden infant death syndrome, the third leading cause of death among infants aged between a week and a year, killing up to 2,500 infants annually in the United States and thousands worldwide. Its causes are believed to be many and are fiercely debated.

Parents can do few things to reduce the risk of their child to die of SIDS. They include not smoking during or after pregnancy, breastfeeding, putting the baby to sleep on his back, avoid use of soft bedding, but the grim truth is that even a perfectly healthy baby can suffer from SIDS and die in his sleep. Nevertheless, scientists have been and are still going to great lengths and making large efforts to find highly effective methods to prevent SIDS.

Such a method was discovered by researchers at the Kaiser Permanente Division of Research in Oakland, Calif., who say that using a fan while a baby is sleeping appears to significantly cut the risk of SIDS.

For the study, the researchers compared information from mothers of 185 infants who died of SIDS with 312 randomly selected, age-matched infants. The infants were also matched based on their race or ethnicity and where they lived. Mothers were interviewed on room location, sleep surface, the type of covers over the baby, fan use, pacifier use, room temperature and whether a window was open.

The study found that using a fan cut the risk of SIDS by 72 percent. Moreover, the use of a fan in a room with a temperature higher than 69 degrees Fahrenheit was associated with a 94 percent decreased risk of SIDS compared with no fan use.

“If parents, in addition to following the American Academy of Pediatrics recommendations for SIDS prevention, want to add an extra layer of protection, they could add a fan to the room,” said study senior author Dr. De-Kun Li, a reproductive and perinatal epidemiologist in the division of research at Kaiser Permanente. However, parents need to be cautious when deciding to use a fan and not place it too close to the crib or in place where a toddler could reach it.

Dr. Li explained that using a fan increases air movement in a baby’s bedroom that could protect babies from re-breathing carbon dioxide trapped near their airways from bedding or sleeping on their stomachs.

Marian Willinger of the National Institutes of Health, which funded the study, named the new findings intriguing but said they need to be followed by additional research. She also added that putting babies to sleep on their backs is still most important thing parents can do to prevent SIDS. Due to this measure highly promoted by a national campaign named “Back to Sleep,” since 1992, the rate of SIDS deaths has dropped by more than half, to about one death per 2,000 live births from 2.4 per 1,000.

However, more training is needed for parents and child-care providers in order to reduce the risk of SIDS, the authors of the study concluded.