Thursday June 9th, 2022
According to healthychildren.org, typically this happens when children have reached the top weight top height allowed for the seat with a harness. The main purpose of the booster seat is to provide additional height for your children so that when they use the seatbelt that comes with the vehicle, the seatbelt will rest in the same position as the adults. For regular setbelts, hildren may remove the shoulder belt, either by placing it under their arm or behind their back. According to CDC research, booster seat usage reduces the risk for serious injuries over 45% compared to just regular seatbelts usage.
What are some of the injuries that are associated with not using booster seats for children?
The head: as stated above, without booster seat, the shoulder strap of the seatbelt when buckled may cause rest on the neck area causing discomfort. With children placing the shoulder strap either behind their back or under the arm, this may lead to a “jackknife motion” when accident occurs. This motion occurs when the upper body rotates around the lap belt area, causing the head to travel very far forward, and have a high probability to hit hard surfaces in the vehicle including back of the front seat, or even their own knees.
The abdomen and lower extremities: According to research, children that use regular seat belt rather than booster seat with restrains are three times more likely to suffer from abdominal organ injury. These injuries include: severe subcutaneous hemorrhage (bruises and contusions to the skin), laceration of the abdominal wall, intra-abdominal hemorrhage (internal bleeding in which blood gathers between your organs and the inner lining of your abdominal wall), rupture of the liver, rupture of the diaphragm, perirenal hemorrhage (a rare but potentially life-threatening condition which is characterized by hemorrhage into kidneys, renal vessels, proximal collecting systems, and adrenal glands).
The spine: The spine is one of the most important areas of the human body. If children are not using the shoulder strap due to discomfort, once in an accident, the human body can only rely on the abdominal strap, which may cause all of the forces stain into the spine area. As a result, this increases the load force on the spine by as much as five folds, as the human body moves forward in an accident due to momentum, and causing the spine to be injured. “Injury to the C5 vertebrae and higher can be fatal because it may inhibit ventilation controlled by the central nervous system. Cervical spinal cord injuries often involve permanent complete or partial loss of sensory function, and many associated complications. As is the case with all injuries of the spinal cord, injuries located higher on the spine will be more severe, with high cervical spinal cord injury often being fatal” (http://www.shepherd.org/…/Cervical-Spinal-Cord-Injury).
We have explained the differences among rear-facing, forward-facing, and booster seats. What is the most common trait among three different seats? They help reduce fatal injuries, and sometimes even death. Therefore, do you still that by not using them just to save money and time is the best thing for your little loved ones?
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