Safer Child Products

We recently got a new flat screen TV for our family room and were discussing what to do with our old, bulky TV.  We decided to put it upstairs in our guest room.  Though it’s not fancy or sleek, it still works just fine.  We have a small cabinet type table that fits it perfectly.  Did we secure it to the wall you might ask?  Since our kids are now 9 and 12, we decided we didn’t have to.  They no longer climb and hang on the furniture, but both of their bookshelves in their bedrooms are secured to the wall.

A report from the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) came out stating that the highest numbers of fatalities from tip-overs were recorded in 2011.  According to the CPSC, 1 child dies every 2 weeks from a TV, furniture, or appliance falling on them. This is an easily preventable tragedy.  There are very inexpensive kits available at your local baby store and hardware store to help you anchor your TV or furniture to the wall.

Toddlers and young children get into everything and move fast.  When baby proofing your house, don’t forget to secure these heavy items.

See the report and diagram from the CPSC on Tip Over Injuries and Fatalities.

http://www.cpsc.gov/cpscpub/prerel/prhtml13/13066.html

http://www.cpsc.gov/library/foia/foia13/os/tipover2012.pdf

Safer Child Products

Wintertime often makes it challenging to find activities to do with our kids to keep them active.  For some it is too cold to play outside or not enough snow to play in.  Something that has become popular in our area is “bounce” type places.  There are big warehouses with several blow up mazes and bouncing castles.  The industry has come a long way since the small moon-bounce that would be set up at carnivals.  I always thought this was clever and a relatively safe indoor activity option.  Then I saw the article in the journal Pediatrics Volume 130, Number 6, December 2012.

This article is about Inflatable Bouncer-Related Injuries.  When I first saw this, I imagined that the injuries would be foot and ankle related from landing wrong, but in fact they reported upper extremity fractures were most common relating to collisions.  From reading this article, and looking at how significantly the number of injuries has increased, I infer it is related to the increase and popularity of these bouncy places. 

Like with any other sport or activity, there is risk of injury.  Set some ground rules for your children, like only one person on the slide a time, and limit how many people in the bouncy castle at a time.  

Have a safe and Happy New Year!