Can they really be serious???

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Specializes in Cardiac, Post Anesthesia, ICU, ER.

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Doctors seek better shopping cart design

By LINDSEY TANNER, AP Medical Writer

Mon Aug 7, 12:53 AM ET

CHICAGO - With more than 24,000 U.S. children treated for shopping cart-related injuries last year, the American Academy of Pediatrics says better designs and stricter government regulation are needed.

Most injuries occur when children aren't strapped in and fall while standing in carts. But many shopping carts are designed with a high center of gravity, making them prone to tipping over even when children are properly placed in the seating area, said Dr. Gary Smith, chairman of an academy committee that wrote the new policy.

Falls onto hard grocery store floors can result in head and neck injuries, and fractures also are common, according to the policy published Monday in the August edition of Pediatrics.

Many injuries involve concussions and are life-threatening, said Smith, an emergency room physician at Children's Hospital in Columbus, Ohio and director of the Center for Injury Research and Policy there.

"Because of that, and because we don't have a standard that adequately addresses the major mechanisms of injury, the best we can do is to caution parents that these injuries are very real, they're very frequent, and if you have a possible alternative" to standard shopping carts, use it, he said.

Alternatives include strollers, wagons, and carts some stores provide that have plastic mini-cars or trucks attached to the front, allowing children to ride much closer to the ground.

Dawn Tolan, a Columbus, Ohio, woman whose 2-year-old daughter fell from a shopping cart in April, said the new policy is needed to make parents aware of the dangers.

Tolan said her daughter, Ellie, stood up in a cart and fell to the floor on her head just as she reached for the child. Hospital tests revealed no serious injuries, but Tolan said the accident "has definitely changed the way I shop."

Now she avoids stores that don't have carts with mini-cars.

According to the academy, about 23,000 U.S. children are treated in emergency rooms for shopping cart-related injuries each year. Last year the total was about 24,200, including 20,700 injuries in children younger than 5.

Smith said injury experts have been aware of the problem for at least 30 years, but no industry standard was adopted until 2004. It is only voluntary, doesn't require specific designs and lacks "clear and effective performance criteria" to address cart stability and prevent falls and tip-overs, the academy policy says.

State and federal laws should be enacted to require minimum safety standards for shopping carts, according to the policy.

In the meantime, pediatricians should warn patients and parents about the dangers, it says.

Children should not be left unattended or allowed to stand up in shopping carts, and shouldn't be allowed to ride in the main grocery basket of the cart or on the outside, the policy says. Seat-belts and other restraints should be worn at all times in the cart, it advises.

The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission issued a similar safety alert in May. CPSC spokeswoman Patty Davis said the agency shares pediatricians' concerns, but added: "Our mandate from Congress is to pursue voluntary standards before we take a mandatory route."

Dr. Joseph Russell, a Plainfield, Ill., pediatrician who has treated several children with shopping cart injuries, said he worked with an engineer to create a prototype in which the child's seat area is much closer to the bottom of the basket, making the cart less likely to tip over.

Russell is trying to get manufacturers interested in the design.

"Even if you use a safety strap, it doesn't address the center of gravity," Russell said. "If the child is strapped in and the cart tips over, where is the benefit?"

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Sounds like stupid parents!!!! I can't believe that there were 24,000 shopping cart related injuries!!!! I think maybe rather than redesigning shopping carts there needs to be some parental re-designing. Typical of today's society, let's not blame the real culprit, just make some new rules. :uhoh3: :smackingf :banghead: :selfbonk:

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Specializes in ICU, CVICU, E.R..

I remember when I was 10 my 5 year old brother decided to unlatch the seatbelt and stand up on the cart while my mom was talking to grocery staff and the cart tipped over since there was nothing in the cart at the time. He got 7 stitches to his head. This happened in the 80's and I still recall it clearly.

I have seen shopping carts designed as cars where kids can be sitting close to the floor instead of up high as most carts are designed. In those particular shopping carts there is absolutely no way any tipping over or any falls can occur.

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I remember when I was 10 my 5 year old brother decided to unlatch the seatbelt and stand up on the cart while my mom was talking to grocery staff and the cart tipped over since there was nothing in the cart at the time. He got 7 stitches to his head. This happened in the 80's and I still recall it clearly.

I have seen shopping carts designed as cars where kids can be sitting close to the floor instead of up high as most carts are designed. In those particular shopping carts there is absolutely no way any tipping over or any falls can occur.

Ok, it's been a few years since I stuck a small child in the seat of a shopping cart, but isn't there some kind of sticker or label or something to clue a parent in as to how big a child should be (or NOT be) to ride that way?? Five seems like he might have just been too big to ride on that seat. Maybe he was a small five, but still....I can easily see how he could fall out like you described. They should be small enough that you can latch the thing and not have them undo it (some belts even latch from the BACK).

When my youngest was too big for that seat and still needed to be "contained" while shopping, I opted for a store that uses the mini-car in the front of the cart. Perfectly safe when used appropriately.

I've got it! Maybe parents need to watch a mandatory video before they can place a child in a shopping cart, kinda like the Shaken Baby video before an OB discharge!! :lol2: Obviously, with 24,000 related accidents a year, there's too much shopping and not enough child-watching.

Sorry, Ma'am, you'll need to prove you are capable of using this device before we can let you use it. :uhoh3:

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Specializes in ICU, ER, HH, NICU, now FNP.

Wait! I know! Let's license parents to have kids!

(I'm being sarcastic - but in some cases I have to wonder)

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Specializes in ER, Teaching, HH, CM, QC, OB, LTC.

I like the video idea!

When did it become the goverments job to protect children??

I must have done something wrong... Because I took responsibility for keeping my child safe.

I know this will get some people mad...

I know those little guys/gals are faster than a speeding bullet...

And I'm for a safer design... But more goverment regulation... come on... I think not.

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Specializes in ICU, ER, HH, NICU, now FNP.

Target has carts that put the kids in chair type things down lower - very nice for toddlers.

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Specializes in LTC.

Wow, people will complain about anything.

I wonder how we all survived shopping carts at children?

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When a product is inherently unsafe by design, and there is not voluntary change within the organizations which use these products, then yes, government has to step in. Some children, even when placed in carts appropriately, are escape artists. My son was even before he could walk. It took one incident where I turned to get something off the shelf, turned back and he was teetering on the edge about to land headfirst onto a hard floor, that made me buy extra safety straps that pretty much locked him into the seat. I had to avoid shopping all together if I forgot the straps. I was vigilant about protecting him, not all parents are. If the safety design is passive, kids are safer. If stores have to be kicked in the butt to provide these, then kick away. I personally think saving one child from a devastating lifelong injury is worth the bother.

I like the video idea!

When did it become the goverments job to protect children??

I must have done something wrong... Because I took responsibility for keeping my child safe.

I know this will get some people mad...

I know those little guys/gals are faster than a speeding bullet...

And I'm for a safer design... But more goverment regulation... come on... I think not.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
I like the video idea!

When did it become the goverments job to protect children??

I must have done something wrong... Because I took responsibility for keeping my child safe.

I know this will get some people mad...

I know those little guys/gals are faster than a speeding bullet...

And I'm for a safer design... But more goverment regulation... come on... I think not.

I agree with you - it wasn't the governments job to protect my kids, it was mine. My kids got hurt a few times doing dumb stuff, and I considered it my responsibility to teach them, or safeguard them - no one elses. If I considered something to be risky, I didn't let them do it. When I went grocery shopping I didn't take the kids.

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I know that my child can unstrap herself in one second flat from ANY grocery cart................it isn't all 'stupid' parenting................

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Wow, people will complain about anything.

I wonder how we all survived shopping carts at children?

my mom waited until my dad came home after work to go grocery shopping-she didn't take us grocery shopping until we were in school and could help carry out grocery bags and walk on our own........

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Specializes in ER, Teaching, HH, CM, QC, OB, LTC.

"When a product is inherently unsafe by design, and there is not voluntary change within the organizations which use these products, then yes, government has to step in. "

No the goverment does not have to step in. Parents need to fight for the child to be safe. Letters to stores that do not offer alternatives, the letters to editors & other groups to draw attention to the need for better design & alternatives. Education related to the growth & developement of children and the proper use of the open type carts....THE VIDEO could help here! (LOL)

I don't believe in "stupid parenting". I've said nothing to other that opinion. But all post state that unattentativeness was at issue. That is not stupid that is shopping. Attention must be divided. (I once lost my 3 yr old on a crowded beach, Only took my sees off for a second ... & gone!)

As a citizen it would have been easier very time that I saw a problem or unsafe issue to punt it to which ever goverment agency would listen, But easy liveing does not change the fact that goverment is not in place to control all issues in very day life.

Many want goverment regulations that would make this situation safe for children But....I ask you this.... Does your older children ride on school buses that are equiped with seat belts???? But that might be for another post!!!!

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