Product
New feature alert: Room temperature monitoring
By Cradlewise Staff
Product
New feature alert: Room temperature monitoring
By Cradlewise Staff
As a parent, you’ve probably already heard that it’s important that your baby goes to sleep on their back, lies on a firm, flat surface, and doesn’t have any toys or bedding in their crib. With all these things to consider, it’s easy to forget room temperature, which also plays a crucial role in both safety and sleep quality.
In honor of Safe Sleep and SIDS Awareness Month in October, we are releasing a new feature in our app: room temperature monitoring, displayed on the home screen, to give you peace of mind and make it easier to check.
How baby’s room temperature affects their sleep
When a baby is in the womb, the mother’s body regulates the temperature of the baby’s surroundings to make sure they are safe and comfortable. Once they’re born, you need to carefully monitor the temperature of your baby’s environment because babies are not as adaptable to temperature changes as adults are—they can lose heat rapidly, up to four times faster than adults.
This happens because when compared to their weight, the surface of a baby’s body is nearly three times greater than adults. The combination of more surface area and lower body weight means babies lose more body heat.
Dr. Anoop Rao MD, Cradlewise Medical Advisor and Neonatologist at the Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital at Stanford, says, “Room temperature plays a crucial role in both sleep quality for infants and safety since overheated babies (from over bundling) are at risk for SIDS. The ideal temperature for babies is generally between 68℉ to 72℉, although it may vary slightly from baby to baby.”
Did you know?
Parents are advised against using hats, hoods, or other head coverings for babies older than four months. While hats and skin-to-skin contact help in maintaining a newborn baby’s temperature above 97.9 degrees, head coverings during sleep are associated with the risk of SIDS in older babies.
Did you know?
Parents are advised against using hats, hoods, or other head coverings for babies older than four months. While hats and skin-to-skin contact help in maintaining a newborn baby’s temperature above 97.9 degrees, head coverings during sleep are associated with the risk of SIDS in older babies.
Why you’ll love our new feature
Rather than having to constantly run into the room to check the thermostat or thermometer, you’ll be able to quickly confirm your baby’s room temperature from anywhere, whether you’re watching Netflix down the hall or getting work done on a business trip.
Room temperature monitors, like the one integrated into Cradlewise, give parents another helpful data point to help make more informed decisions about their baby’s needs, like whether they need to use lighter-weight pajamas or a sleep sack to help their child get a better night’s rest.
“ Room temperature monitors, like the one integrated into Cradlewise, give parents another helpful data point to help make more informed decisions about their baby’s needs, like whether they need to use lighter-weight pajamas or a sleep sack to help their child get a better night’s rest.”
– Dr. Anoop Rao, MD
You can also increase sleep quality—not to mention your own!—by making sure they are comfortable.
What’s the ideal room temperature for babies?
The ideal temperature for babies is generally between 68°F to 72°F, although it may vary slightly from baby to baby. You know your baby best, so trust your judgment when checking if they are too hot or cold. For example, some babies seem to get sweaty more easily than others. That doesn’t necessarily mean that they are feeling uncomfortably hot.
To check if your baby is comfortable with the temperature, feel the nape of their neck or tummy. Checking their hands and feet might not give an accurate reading because a baby’s core temperature will be slightly warmer than their hands and feet since they cannot thermoregulate quickly.
Did you know?
A Canadian study found that for infants between the ages of three and 12 months, the risk of SIDS was 2.78 times greater on days when temperatures were above 84.2°F than on days when the mercury was steady at 68°F.
Did you know?
A Canadian study found that for infants between the ages of three and 12 months, the risk of SIDS was 2.78 times greater on days when temperatures were above 84.2°F than on days when the mercury was steady at 68°F.
Where to find it and what else to know
You can access the new room temperature feature at the top-right corner of the home screen in your Cradlewise App.
If you travel to a location that uses a different unit of temperature and your phone’s operating system switches to that unit (such as from Fahrenheit to Celsius), the Cradlewise App will also switch.
To access this new feature, please make sure you update to the latest version of the Cradlewise app.
For more features that are launching this year, check out our tech roadmap.
Learn more about the ideal room temperature for your baby, and the tips to make them comfortable.
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