Now is the time for childproofing your home

With only a month or so until summer is up, now might be an excellent time to consider childproofing your home.   Many parents can become quite busy around the fall season with the start of school, homework, soccer practices, PTA meetings, etc. (not to stress you out).   Furthermore, for many, fall begins a time when more people enter your home because of football season and the holidays.   This can lead to extra little ones running around your home and it is important that both you and your house are prepared.  Consequently, even though you may have less time for projects, this one should be at the top of your “To Do” list.

In fact, did you know that every year, there are more than 3,000,000 unintentional injuries to children 14 and under that happen in the home and require care in an emergency room? That works out to 8,219 injuries per day.   And sadly, each day approximately six children die from injuries resulting from fires, burns, drowning, poisoning, choking, suffocation, strangulation, and falls in the home.

Kids can be curious and do not always understand the difference between toys and dangerous objects.  Take a thorough look at your home and ask yourself – what looks interesting for my child to play with that could lead to an unsafe situation?

Babies who can sit and crawl are at risk for choking, poisoning, burns, falls, and furniture tip-overs. Once your little one becomes mobile and begins to cruise around, childproofing becomes even more important.

So what can you do as a parent? While constant supervision is the most important safety precaution you can take, it is impractical and sometimes not enough. To create a safer home for your child, look for potential hazards and take steps to remove them before it is too late.  You should also review a home safety checklist that will help remind you of some of the spots in your home you might have forgot.