Beware: These 5 Things Can Hurt Your Kids

There’s no shortage of unusual ways a child can get hurt. You can safely child proof your house, or keep your children under strict supervision, and they would still find ways to get injured.

Here are 5 strange ways that children can get hurt themselves:

1. Playground Slides

It’s harmless to let your child go on a slide at a playground, or even have your child sit on your lap and slide down. Parents sliding down with children may do more harm than good. When on a parent’s lap, a child’s foot might get caught on the sides of a slide, making it hard to free the foot because of the extra momentum from an adult’s weight. Parents could also fall on top of a small child after sliding down. It is recommended that toddlers slide by themselves, with parental supervision.

2. Shopping carts

These days, a typical visit to Shoprite involves letting your toddler ride in the cart, sometimes an older sibling or parent even pushes the child in the cart just for the whees and the excited screams. Shopping-cart injuries are dangerous because a fall to a hard surface can result in head and neck injuries, or when a cart flips over broken bones may occur. It is best to avoid this “fun” game all together as one can never be too careful.

3. TVs and furniture

Toddlers and young children climb onto dressers, bookcases or storage cabinets in an attempt to reach a toy or whatever catches there attention, or play games with themselves. These heavy items can topple over, fall onto a child and pin someone underneath, sometimes even killing a youngster. Take appropriate measure to attach dressers and other cabinets firmly to the wall.

4. Hair-thread tourniquet syndrome

Hair tourniquet is a medical condition wherein a hair or other thread becomes tied around a toe or finger tightly, so as to put at risk of damage. It is adorable to play counting games on babies’ fingers and toes, or playfully nibble on their fingers. But if a strand of hair or piece of thread unexpectedly gets wrapped around a baby’s delicate digits, it can cut off circulation to the area. The three places where hair-thread tourniquet syndrome is most likely to occur is on a babies finger, feet or baby boy’s penis. Parents may notice a swollen toe turning purple and their infant crying inconsolably in pain. Ensure that a children’s socks are cleaned, remove dangling threads from their clothes or gloves.

5. Car-seat rash

As safe as car seats are, they can bring about big, itchy rashes on infants. It happens in hot temperatures, sweaty surfaces, or a nylon-like car-seat material coming in contact with a baby’s skin. A rash usually starts on exposed skin on the back of infants’ legs, elbows and scalp. There is no known cause yet, but nylon-lined car seats are a suspect. The rash often can be avoided by placing a barrier, such as cotton padding or a soft sheet, as a liner between the child’s skin and the seat’s nylon surface. If you can find one made of cotton, that will be much better.