There’s a lot for parents to consider when it comes to car seat safety.
To start, it’s important to avoid some common mistakes that can making riding more dangerous for young children.
Of course, always remember to read the car seat manufacturer’s instructions. In addition, you’ll want to take special care with where you place the car seat, the direction it faces, installation and buckling in the kids.
[See: 10 Concerns Parents Have About Their Kids’ Health.]
Center or Side? Where to Put the Car Seat
The center of the back seat is generally the safest place in a car to install a car seat, based on research from real crashes.
If you have two kids, you don’t have to play favorites to decide who gets the middle. Since forward-facing offers less protection than rear-facing, give an older forward-facing child the center and the rear-facing child the side, so long as the kids get along well enough to sit next to each other and the car seats install securely side-by-side.
Have Your Kids Look Back
Rear-facing is safer than forward facing. Period.
Front and side impact crashes are the two most common and deadly types of crashes, and the physics are always in your favor when rear-facing in these crashes. Skeptical? Astronauts ride rear-facing during blast-off and when they reenter the earth’s atmosphere for the same reason that we want kids riding rear-facing. The rear-facing position allows the passenger to tolerate the excessive G-forces by absorbing the forces into the shell of the seat and then distributing the remaining forces along the entire back. On the contrary, when forward-facing, the head gets pulled violently away from the chest.
Your child should be in a car seat that’s rear-facing until at least 2 years old, which is the recommendation from the American Academy of Pediatrics, and the law in a handful of states. So let’s clear up a few things you’re probably thinking:
First, your toddler is not too big. Your child may be too big for a rear-facing infant car seat, but he or she will fit nicely looking back in a convertible car seat, which is a car seat that starts out rear-facing and later goes forward-facing. Look for a convertible seat that has a high rear-facing weight and height capacity to keep your child rear-facing well beyond the age of 2.
Second, your child’s legs are fine. Actually, better than fine. Forward-facing kids suffer far more leg injuries than rear-facing kids. That’s because, in the event of a crash, the legs of a forward-facing passenger fly up and hit the front seat; as the car seat moves forward it can break a leg. Rear-facing kids tuck into a cannonball-like position on impact, and this does not cause injury.
Preschoolers have much more flexibility in their ankle, knee and hip joints than we do. So they can sit comfortably in positions we can’t.
[Read: From Car Seat to Driver’s Seat: Keeping Kids Safe.]
Installation: Seat Belt or Lower Anchors?
The seat belt and lower anchors are two different means of securing the car seat to the vehicle. One is typically not safer than the other. However, some car seats are easier to install using a seat belt, while other seats are easier to install using lower anchors.
If installing in the center seat, the decision is typically simple: Use a seat belt. The reason for this is that very few vehicles have the lower anchors for the center seat.
If installing on the side seats, you will typically have lower anchors, unless you are in the third row of a minivan or an SUV, which frequently don’t have lower anchors in some or all of the third row seats. Lower anchors have weight limits. So check your car seat’s manual to ensure you haven’t reached the weight limit — after which you’ll need to use a seat belt to install the seat.
Forward-facing? Always Use a Tether
The tether is the most important part of every forward-facing car seat. Every single forward-facing car seat in the U.S. has a tether strap. The tether strap comes from the top of the car seat and has a hook on the end that will connect to the tether anchor in the vehicle.
Every vehicle in the U.S. since 2003 has tether anchors in at least three seating positions. However, many minivans and SUVs don’t have tether anchors in some or all of the third row seats. Read your vehicle’s owner’s manual to see where your tether anchors are.
Forward-facing car seats are always safer when using a tether, since this will decrease how far the child’s head will move in a crash by at least 4 to 6 inches. That can mean the difference between the child’s head hitting the back of the front seat in a crash, or not.
Tethers are for forward-facing car seats, where the child uses a five-point harness as their restraint. Tethers aren’t required (or often found) on booster seats, where the child uses the vehicle’s seat belt across them as their restraint.
[See: The 11 Most Dangerous Places in Your Home for Babies and Small Kids.]
Buckling the Child in Properly (Read: Snugly)
In the winter, keep kids warm with thin, tight layers in the car — and not puffy coats and snowsuits which leave straps too loose during a crash. There are lots of ways to keep kids warm and safe that allow them to be snugly buckled into their car seat. These include dressing children in layers, using tight-fitting fleece jackets and laying a blanket over the car seat straps.
Make sure to straighten twisted straps as well, since twisted straps can act like a rope and increase the risk of injury.
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Car Seat Safety: Avoid These Common Mistakes originally appeared on usnews.com
