Paramedic gives tips, advice on infant car seats

By EMS1 Staff

TOOWOOMBA, Australia — An Australian paramedic took to her blog to shed light on what she thinks is an overlooked aspect when choosing a car seat: the parent’s ability to strap the child in.

Michigan Auto Law reported that Krystal Kleidon, author of the blog Project Hot Mess, used what she’s seen as a paramedic to approach the topic of properly strapping your child into a car seat to ensure their safety.

Kleidon said the amount of money you spend on a car seat doesn’t matter if the child cannot be strapped in properly.

“Between my husband and I, in our 20 years’ experience, we have not seen a single child harmed in a car accident where the child was restrained in their seat properly. Not a single one,” Kleidon said in her blog.

Kleidon said to ask yourself these four questions when choosing a car seat:

• How tight do the straps go?
• Can the child pull his or her arms out?
• How many fingers can you fit under the straps? Only one or two?
• Is the child wearing bulky clothing that prevents being strapped in properly?

The last question she said to ask yourself is if you’d feel comfortable holding the seat upside down with your child strapped in to see how well it works.

Kleidon said the exercise will test how effective the seat straps are in order to prevent injury while driving down the road.

https://www.facebook.com/ProjectHotMess/posts/1452036831555747:0