Tips To Stay Safe During Brain Injury Awareness Month

March 14, 2016

Spring is in the air in much of the country, and kids who have spent months bundled up during the winter are ready to get outside and play. For many kids, that means riding their bikes, scooters, or skateboards with friends through the neighborhood.

March is Brain Injury Awareness Month, and helping keep children safe from head injuries is very important. A traumatic brain injury (TBI) occurs when someone's head is hit by something or shaken violently. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, approximately 1.7 million people receive TBIs each year. Of children up to 19 years old, TBI results in 631,146 trips to the emergency room each year.

Brain injuries, including concussions, can occur to kids while biking, during sports games or even on a playground if they were to fall while playing and hit their head. As a parent, before you let your kids go out biking, you need make sure that their helmet from last season still fits properly. If you have to buy a new helmet, make sure it fits snug. Buying a larger size that they can grow into can lead to disastrous consequences if they fall and hit their head. If the helmet doesn't fit properly, it won't protect as it should in the event of a fall.

What Symptoms Should Parents Look For?

According to Parent Center Hub, the term traumatic brain injury is used to describe trauma to the head that can cause permanent changes to areas of their mental cognition such as:

Thinking and reasoning
Understanding certain words or parts of language.
Short-term memory loss
Paying attention
Problem-solving
Thinking abstractly
Speech and other communication skills
Behavioral patterns
Walking or other physical activities
The ability to learn new things, especially if a skill was never introduced to the child before trauma.

According to the Brain Injury Association of America, there are some essential ways to protect your children’s safety and significantly reduces the risk of brain injury. make sure your children (and you), stay safe from brain injuries:

Wear a seat belt every time riding in a motor vehicle.
Buckle children in the car using a child safety seat, booster seat, or seat belt according to the child’s height, weight and age. Children should start using a booster seat when they outgrow their child safety seats. Children should continue to ride in a booster seat until the lap/shoulder belts in the car fit properly, typically when they are approximately 4-foot-9 tall. Local police or fire departments often have clinics for parents to help make sure child safety seats are properly installed.
Wear a helmet and make sure children wear helmets that are fitted properly. Specialty bike shops generally have staff member who are great at fitting helmets. The right helmets can reduce the risk of severe brain injuries by 88 percent, according to SafeKids.org.
Make sure playground surfaces are made of shock-absorbing materials, such as hardwood mulch or sand, and are maintained to an appropriate depth.
Use the right protective equipment and make sure it is maintained properly.

Help Local Children’s Charities

Each year, many children are affected by serious or chronic (?) medical condition. Vehicle donations help to provide these children with better lives. Donate a car, truck, motorcycle, boat, or camper and let Wheels For Wishes turn your vehicle into hope and encouragement for a child in your community.

When you donate a vehicle to Wheels For Wishes, your donation will go towards supporting the children’s charities in your area. See which charity your donation will benefit by checking out our Chapter Locator. When you donate a car, truck, boat, or motorcycle to Wheels For Wishes, you will receive free pick up or towing of your vehicle. To make a car donation, simply call 1-855-278-9474 or make your donation online.

Help to support children’s charities by donating your vehicle to Wheels For Wishes.