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Home › Articles › Home Safety Issues › Toppling TVs

Toppling TVs

Taking Precautions to Keep Kids Safe

By Teri Brown

Pages:  1  2  3  

Dr. Floyd S. Ota, an attending emergency department physician at the Children's Medical Center of Dallas and an assistant professor of pediatrics for the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, says it's difficult to know the exact number of injuries from this type of accident. "We really do not know the true statistics since many do not come to the emergency department," says Dr. Ota. "Previous studies suggest this injury mechanism is on the rise."

Common Injuries
Dr. Ota says they found during the study that injuries sustained from falling TVs are to all parts of the body. "The most common injury was to the head (intra-cranial bleeding, skull fracture, bruises and lacerations), and the next most frequent were to the extremities in the way of fractures and bruises," says Dr. Ota. "A few children had multi-system injuries. Nine children required hospital admission, two in the ICU (intracranial bleeding). One went to the operating room for repair of a large facial laceration. No child died. However, there have been deaths reported in the medical literature. Most of the injuries were minor; however, the potential for severe injury exists."

Preventing Disaster
There are things that both parents and manufacturers can do to avoid this type of accident, says Dr. Marcus Hanfling, medical director of the Harris County Hospital District Pediatric Injury Prevention Clinic in Houston, Texas.

"Manufacturers can manufacture TVs that are not 'front loaded,' which makes them easier to tip over," says Dr. Hanfling. "They could also provide a strap or anchor that would provide the TV added stability so it would not be prone to tipping over."


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