Estimated read time: 2-3 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
Ed Yeates ReportingCongress is about to drive home the message of Shaken Baby Syndrome like never before. The father behind that national legislation - along with a researcher whose launched some of the most dramatic studies ever on SBS - are in Utah right now.
It's one of the largest gatherings of its kind. Park City is hosting the North American Conference on Shaken Baby Syndrome. This time around, more than 450 people are throwing their support behind research and legislation.
It's one thing to demonstrate shaken baby syndrome with a doll and then to see the new highly realistic model developed by a Japanese Company. It is being used by Dr. Carole Jenny at Brown Medical School.
Carole Jenny, M.D., Brown Medical School: "As the baby's head swings back and forth, the strain on the tissue - the amount of deformation on the tissue - starts to accumulate."
The shaking, in slow motion, actually follows a timeline of only five seconds or so. As the head shakes back and forth, stress and damage inside the brain goes deeper and deeper.
Carole Jenny, M.D.: "The strains get deeper and deeper into the brain tissue and accumulates to higher and higher levels until you have tissue failure - until you actually end up with brain damage."
Professionals, victims and family, they were all there to see this latest research, but something else, too. This conference is more than just teaching people about what happens; it's spearheading a national educational campaign that's taking this message directly into communities, plus toughening laws against the perpetrators of shaken baby syndrome.
Darryl Gibbs is the father of eight-month-old Cynthia Gibbs who died six years ago in New York at the hands of a licensed child care provider.
Darryl Gibbs: "A woman that we knew. A woman who had no criminal history. A woman that we trusted."
Gibbs is pushing for tougher penalty laws and he's now awaiting word from Congress on a new educational bill.
Darryl: Gibbs: "A massive campaign about shaken baby syndrome through television, radio print -- the works."
That fully funded campaign would expose almost every parent in every community to not only the dangers of SBS, but ways to divert anger - in a healthy way - away from the infant.
