Child Safety Car Seat
When buying a car seat, parents want to get the very best item to protect their baby. Although parents obviously are putting forth the protection to keep their child safe, many are doing it incorrectly, as the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration discovered that almost 4 in every five cases of them misused the safety seats they placed their child in. By failing to properly use the safety restraints, the study reports, many parents unknowingly put their child in peril. Typically, the biggest mistakes were loose harness straps and safety belt attachments. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration calls these misuses ‘critical’ because they can cause some of the greatest potential for injury.
{So how do you know make sense of keeping your newborn safe?}
Strive to get the perfect seat for your child’s particular age and weight and then make sure you put the seat in the correct position once you do. Children who are tinier than 20 pounds and younger than one year can ride in a rearward-facing car seat. These tiny seats are custom-designed for newborns; after all, they wrap around him or her tightly and allow the parent the ease of carrying the child wherever they need to go. The infant-only car seats should also always be placed in the back seat of the car, in the rear-facing position.
Convertible seats allow the safety seat to grow with the child. These types of safety car seats will not be tiny – if they were, they could not support the child as it grew. Again, weight and age are important when determining the proper position for the child’s seat; if the child is younger than one year and under the twenty pound requirement, the seat should be rear facing. Children should be placed in a forward facing seat once they reach the age and weight threshold, and should stay in one until they are 40 pounds. Always make sure that whichever seat you pick out for your child, you know how it is supposed to be used. Read the seat’s instructions and your vehicle owner’s guide. Two sets of buckles must be snapped correctly for the car seat to function as designed: those holding the baby in place and those holding the car seat in place. Of the critical components that the study by the NHTSA found, the biggest majority dealt with parents who did not have the harness strap in the right slot or fitting snuggly enough. If strapping the harness into a slot position in a convertible, the appropriate slots are above or at the shoulder; if using an infant car seat, the appropriate place is below. All seats come with a guide tell exactly where the harness clip should be located, but parents should always place it about armpit height and around straps that are not twisted.
It helps seat belt placement to recline the seat 45 degrees; always double check that your seat belt is in the right path for the position of the seat. A helpful tip is a rolled towel underneath the base. If needed, tighten the seat belt to make sure the restraint is secure. LATCH systems will require you to follow the exact details that should be listed in the vehicle owner’s guide and the car seat manufacturer’s guide. All seats must also be considered for general condition and age; the latter is particularly true if you are buying a used seat. Don’t use a seat that is more than five years old or does not come with the manufacturer’s instructions. Your seat may look great and be in otherwise great shape, but avoid purchasing if it is missing parts or has been in accident.
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