High-end baby monitors: When they help and when they hurt

After we brought our baby girl home from the hospital in October 2024, it didn’t take long for the baby monitor to start driving me bonkers. In the first months – especially after a traumatic health scare with a BRUE – I clicked on the video monitor obsessively during her naps to reassure myself that she was fine. If she hadn’t made a sound in 15 minutes, I’d click the monitor to take a look. If she hadn’t changed positions, I’d click-click-click to zoom in and make sure I could see her breathing.

But by six months, I started to get it under control. I realized the monitoring was making me anxious and distracted – I felt frenzied trying to wrap up a work task or house chore when she made the slightest movement. Plus, our house is small and I can easily hear her when she cries. Now, I mostly only look at the monitor when I hear her cry: Do I really need to go grab her, or is she self-soothing back to sleep?

So … am I doing it right? Is it wrong that I’m not monitoring her more closely when there are expensive monitors promising peace of mind and measuring oxygen levels, heart rate and sleep patterns? Is it weird that the camera monitor ramps up my anxiety instead of putting me at ease? How do parents like me monitor our babies to make sure they’re safe, while also protecting our own sanity?

I talked to Dr. Megan Collins, a mother and pediatrician with Novant Health Dilworth Pediatrics, as well as Jaren Doby, a parent and social worker with Novant Health Psychiatric Associates - Randolph. Here’s what I learned.

Does the average healthy baby need digital monitoring?

Collins: The most ideal form of monitoring is your own ears in a room-share, or having your baby sleep within hearing distance. If you can room-share in the first six months, there’s an association with a reduced risk of SIDs, but room-sharing isn’t possible for everyone.

While baby digital monitoring isn’t critical, are there still scenarios where it can be helpful?

Collins: If you’re going to be out of hearing distance, like if you’re playing outside with your older child while your baby naps, an audio monitor can be sufficient.

Is it normal to feel the urge to continually check the baby monitor?

Doby: Parental anxiety is normal – you’re responsible for the well-being of a new person. The concerns we have for our children and making sure they are OK is normal. For parents who have experienced a traumatic event or who have a child with health problems, this can also be an understandable form of hypervigilance. It’s natural to be on guard, looking for potential threats even when there is no real danger.

For some parents, fancy baby monitors do offer peace of mind. For others, they can start to generate an unhealthy fear response, is that right?

Doby: When it becomes clinically distressing, impeding on your ability to function around your home and take care of yourself, this is when we start getting into areas of more concern. We have to be careful that this isn’t placing inherent fear in us: That you have to constantly make sure your baby is OK and, if you don’t, that your baby won't be OK.

Are at-home digital baby monitors accurate when it comes to health information?

Collins: At times, monitors can lead to unnecessary emergency room visits, if parents see something on a monitor at home that indicates changes in pulse rate or oxygen levels, when in reality, everything is totally fine. With oxygen monitoring and respiratory monitoring, even hospital-grade equipment is not always reliable; it notoriously loses signal, for example, when a baby moves around. For these readings to really be accurate, a medical professional needs to be monitoring the baby.

If you’re following safe-sleep recommendations, should you constantly monitor your baby when they’re sleeping?

Collins: Some parents find they spend too much time watching a video monitor. If your baby is sleeping, it’s good to be able to use the time to rest yourself, or to do other things – there’s no benefit to watching them sleep. As long as you’re following safe sleep recommendations – there should be nothing in the crib but the baby, for example – you shouldn’t feel the need to over monitor the baby when they’re sleeping.

So, it’s healthy to trust that you can keep your baby safe with or without a monitor?

Doby: If you are creating an environment that is conducive for a positive and safe sleep, and you’re not increasing risk factors in any way, you can assure yourself that you’re doing the right thing to make sure your baby is safe. Challenge negative, unwanted thoughts with the truth, not with what-ifs.

Tell yourself things like: “I’m not doing anything in my house that can impact their ability to breathe or live long, healthy lives.” And: “I just checked on them five minutes ago and they were fine.” Being mindful of your own anxiety can help decrease it. It just takes practice.