You have your own busy schedule and so many places to be during the week. And when you have kids you soon realize, for such young lives their schedule fills up surprisingly fast too. School, sports, doctor visits, play dates, you name it. Soon, you’re on the road making ten stops in a day.
Accidents the Biggest Threat to a Child
When kids spend so much time in the car as passengers, there is an increased chance that a negligent driver can hit your car with them inside. Researchers at the CDC confirm vehicle accidents are the number one killer of children (under the age of 19). Nothing else is more deadly to a young life.
While you might do everything you can to safely get your family from point A to point B, sometimes you can’t avoid another driver on the road who isn’t being as careful.
Children at Risk Even When Restrained
The CDC released the sad numbers on children in auto accidents in the U.S. tracked over 12 months. In a single year, 675 children 12 years old and younger died as occupants in motor vehicle crashes. Almost 116,000 more children were left with injuries from accidents.
What’s even scarier, of the children who died in those crashes (for which restraint use was known), 65% were actually restrained or buckled up the right way.
The takeaway is that even a child seat or seatbelt is far from a guarantee your son or daughter will escape serious injury.
Rollover Accidents Especially Dangerous
Rollover accidents are particularly dangerous for children. Young victims are much more likely to suffer an incapacitating injury during a rollover than any other kind of auto accident. Restraints, of course, do help in these cases. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration found that a restrained child in rollover cases has three times the chance of avoiding severe injury than an unrestrained child.
Common Injuries Children Suffer
A child’s brain and body are uniquely vulnerable in a violent collision because those tender areas are still growing and developing. Children can suffer very different injuries than a parent in the same accident. Even injuries among different age groups of children can greatly differ.
Head injuries and concussions are the most common and most dangerous injury for a child of any age. Infants are at particular risk. Injuries to the chest area are also common. This includes damage to organs like the heart and lungs. The ribcage and a child’s airways are also vulnerable.
A further list of the injuries children can suffer in a collision can be found HERE.
Contact A Personal Injury Lawyer
If your child has physical injuries and perhaps emotional trauma from an accident that was someone else’s fault it’s important to protect your family’s future. Your child needs the best care to recover and be able to return to just being a kid. The cost of this recovery should be covered by the person responsible for the crash. Their insurance company should pay for the damages your family suffered in this tragic accident.
Accident victims often wonder if they need an attorney, and the answer is almost always yes. Especially when the well-being of a child is involved. Insurance company agents have years of experience and are good at their job which is to pay you as little as possible or nothing at all. You need someone just as experienced to help you level the field.
The attorneys at Kaufman & Stigger, PLLC, have that knowledge and a combined 100 years’ experience in helping clients get the results they deserve. Contact Kaufman & Stigger, PLLC today, at (800) 937-8443 or click here to contact them online.
