Chiropractic Health & Wellness Blog

Kids injured in sledding accidents

March 13, 2014
23,000 kids injured in sledding accidents, doctors urge parents to make children wear helmets Lyn Lake Chiropractic and Dr Kevin Schreifels would like to share these articles to help protect you and your children. I live next to a park that has a big sledding hill and everyday we see a few injuries from this hill. I’m amazed that 80% of the children sledding don’t wear helmets. If you look at the hockey rink you’ll see every young person wearing a helmet. If you or your children are flying down a hill somewhat in control, down! Why not put a helmet on them?!!

You can use a hockey helmet, ski helmet or a bike helmet. Something to protect their little head incase something goes wrong. My children love wearing their helmets, they feel safer plus the helmet keeps their head warm. Here’s a couple articles from the web: Quick read more or view full article Sledding season - experts are cautioning parents to take safety precautions more seriously. A study published earlier this year showed that every kid's favorite snow day tradition could be more dangerous than parents in the past thought. In the study, published in the journal Pediatrics in September, researchers found that 230,000 sledding-related injuries were reported by emergency rooms from 1997-2007. Analysis of the data showed that children 10 to 14 sustained 42.5% of injuries, and boys were almost 10% more likely to sustain injuries than girls.

The findings, which showed that the most frequent injuries were fractures and other injuries to the head, gave doctors more reason to push safer sledding practices. Lara McKenzie, who led the study at Center on Injury Research and Policy at Nationwide Children's Hospital, told MNSBC the information gives pediatricians more reason to strongly encourage parents to require their kids to wear helmets before hitting the mini-slopes. ""I want them to go sledding, I want them to have fun, but we could do a better job,"" McKenzie said. ""Twenty thousand injuries a year for an activity you can only do a couple days a year is big."" The study recommended that parents should discourage their kids from using sledding prospects such as snow tubes that may reduce visibility. The American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons recommended that while sledding, kids should use common sense: avoid public streets, sit in a forward-facing position, and never sled headfirst. They also advised against the cheapest version of a sled embraced by many college kids especially: plastic sheets.

Across the board though, doctors stress the importance of wearing a helmet to avoid major injuries. And that's a lesson learned the hard way for parents across the country, including Ron Miller and his wife Holly Wastler-Miller, who lost their 12-year-old son, Ian, in a sledding accident. They are trying to get a law passed to require kids younger than 16 to wear helmets when they go sledding in public snow parks. ""Had Ian been wearing a helmet, he would be alive today,"" One more! Statistics from the U.S. Census Bureau were used to calculate injury estimates. Researchers say research is needed to determine whether helmets would reduce injury rates. They also examined the types of sledding vehicles involved in injuries, from sleds and snow tubes to toboggans and snow disks. Among other findings: * Children aged 9 and older were more likely to be injured through collisions. * Children aged 4 and younger were more likely to be involved in accidents with vehicles. * One third of injuries were caused by young people being pulled by motorized vehicles. What the!!!

The use of sleds that can rotate, such as disks and snow tubes, should be discouraged. Younger children should be supervised by parents when sledding. From WebMD.com If you have any questions please feel free to contact us at Lyn Lake Chiropractic. Just because your head is protected, don’t forget your spine takes a beating, and getting adjusted on a regular basis would be another way to protect you and your children! Stay healthy and call your chiropractor! After sledding my 5 yr old came to me and said she felt her neck and back was twisted and she felt sore! I asked her what would she like me to do, she asked me to adjust her spine to put her bones back in place so she doesn't feel twisted. I thought to myself, now that would be another reason to remind parents kids need to be adjusted too!!! Read Less

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