Sledding can send kids slip-sliding into injury, study says , should helmets be required by law?

[The Straight Story]

Sledding can send kids slip-sliding into injury, study says

It’s a thrill as old as the hills: a kid, a sled and a snowy slope.

But as early-season storms continue to wallop the nation this month, researchers warn that the traditional wintry slide actually carries some pretty serious risks.

Whether they’re gliding on plain plastic saucers or high-tech snow tubes, children and teens on sleds account for at least 20,820 injuries in the United States each year, according to a first-ever analysis of U.S. emergency room reports.

“I want them to go sledding, I want them to have fun, but we could do a better job,” said Lara McKenzie, principal investigator for the Center on Injury Research and Policy at Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus, Ohio, who led the study. “Twenty thousand injuries a year for an activity you can only do a couple days a year is big.”


Overall, McKenzie and her colleagues estimated that nearly 230,000 children and teens age 19 and younger were treated for sledding injuries in emergency departments between 1997 and 2007. Their work was published in a recent issue of the journal Pediatrics.

....

Ian’s parents have spent the months since his death working to get public snow parks and ski areas to require helmets for sledders.

“We are not trying to legislate people’s private lives,” Ian’s mother said, noting that their proposal wouldn’t affect people sledding on private property.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/40479252/ns/health-kids_and_parenting/

[Recursion]

1. THINK OF THE CHILDREN!!!

Yes, by all means we must legislate away every single possibility of risk to a child.

[Dr Morbius]

2. At the state or local level, yes. Laws should be passed to protect kids.

But not at the national level, at least not to begin with. As I see it, the more intrusive we allow government to be, the closer to the people it should be. So if a law that mandates something parents must purchase to allow their kids to play in the snow is to be passed, it should be something those parents have a better chance of fighting if they want to. I don't think federal government should be so intrusive, unless the states take the lead and a majority of them adopt such a rule. Similarly, I think individual cities and towns should be allowed to ban handguns if they so desire; the closer to the people a governmental body is, the better the chance of an individual to make an impact upon legislation.

[Uben]

3. Helmets before birth

Newborns are subject to head injuries from delivery tongs and accidental falls from the womb at birth. Helmets are now required for all fetuses at 3 months.

[eShirl]

4. natural selection improves species

[ibegurpard]

5. let's just keep our children under lock and key...

[napi21]

6. NO! For God sake people! Do you really te want to put

your kids in a protective bubble? Yes you can get hurt sled riding. But you can get hurt falling on the ice, getting hit with a snowball, and a host of other things in the winter weather. I agree with wearig kneepads while skatboarding or even roller blades, but you can't shelter your kids from EVERYTHING without also harming their learning. Explain the dangers of sledrding into hard objects, roll off the damn sled if you're heading for a tree or someother hard object, then just let them have fun!

[sandyj999]

7. And let's just outlaw tree climbing. Or don't kids do that any more?

I guess I was a lucky kid. I climbed trees, roller skated on a rough sidewalk and rode my bike on a gravel road with no protection and survived. Did I lead a charmed life? I never had a broken bone and never knew of one kid in my town that ever suffered a serious injury.

There is a way more serious danger lurking. Parents worry about their kid not wearing a helmet yet these are the same parents that allow their own children exposure to violent video games. I see it with my own great grandchildren. They are exposed to this crap and allowed to play it in their own home . This can be way more destructive than falling off your bike without a helmet.

[surrealAmerican]

12. You're kidding, right.

Falling of a bicycle without a helmet can be fatal. Are you trying to suggest that your great-grandchildren would be better off dead than playing those games?

[sandyj999]

35. I was making a comparison with sarcasm sorry you didn't get it.

I am assuming that you have no children or if you do they don't have any of those games. Am I right?

[surrealAmerican]

47. Your assumption is completely incorrect on both counts.

Yes my son does have a few violent games. He's a gentle, good person, an excellent student, and we're quite proud of him in many ways.

You might consider using the sarcasm "smiley". It is very hard to tell in short snips of writing when somebody is being sarcastic, unless you know them quite well.

[woo me with science]

8. TSA should grope their crotches before they go out there, too.

You never know what might happen.

[annabanana]

9. oh FFS

enough

[woo me with science]

10. Did you know some children also take BAKED GOODS with them, when they sled? nt

[surrealAmerican]

13. Those poor little muffins.

They'll get all smushed.

[woo me with science]

34. This is why TSA patdowns are totally necessary. nt

[Safetykitten]

41. Yes, exactly. A 30 minute waiting period before donning helmet and sledding after bake sale.

[Anakin Skywalker]

11. No. This Can of Worms Will Never End!

What's next? Skateboarding? Think of other activities.....

[surrealAmerican]

14. This ought to be related to how steep the sledding hill is ...

... and how slick the snow is. Also, the statistic we actually need is how many serious head injuries, not how many injuries. A helmet will not keep a kid from breaking her arm.

Just what sort of "public snow parks and ski areas" are they talking about? Are these areas that are already supervised?

[Vinca]

15. I say we encase all children in protective bubbles.

[blueamy66]

42. Exactly.

I must have been in one of those bubbles...I survived riding a bike withoug shoes (GASP), swimming in irrigation ditches, riding horses to a bar, across a paved street (GASP AGAIN) to pick up the drunk dairy hand, sledding down the cotton at the gin on cardboard and running around the pool.

Kids these days are missing out on so much fun. :-)

[Bucky]

44. Then here's a picture of a kid ready to go sledding

[FLPanhandle]

16. Maybe we should just ban everything that could cause a child injury

Then we can insist on full body armor while they pretend sled on their wii game system.

You can't have too many rules & regulations from authorities.

[NotThisTime]

17. honestly it would be good if they wore helmets skiing or snowboarding...

Some resorts make it mandatory... sledding not so much...

[Locrian]

18. i remember sledding

When I was a kid we used to sled down some crazy hills. I cant believe I didnt break my neck about 100 times....

Maybe the best way would be to have helmets be "cool"?

[Edweird]

23. Helmets are only 'cool' when you actually NEED them.

Motocross and downhill/freeride mountain biking for example. Any other use = you are a dork. Seriously. That's how 'cool' works.

[JBoy]

19. How I learned about safety while playing: "Ow, that fucking hurts."

[FLPanhandle]

21. +1

Exactly!

[sandyj999]

36. Exactly! That is how I learned to not try to open the metal latch on the gate with

my tongue because my arms were full of school books.

[Nye Bevan]

20. Yes. And snowmen should be limited to a maximum height of 36 inches.

Many people are unaware of the dangers of snowmen toppling onto our children. But we can't be too careful.

[WolverineDG]

22. Why don't we just wrap kids in 100 lbs of bubble wrap & be done with it?

Seriously.

dg

[sarcasmo]

24. More intrusive government laws and mandates. Create jobs you dumb bastards.

[Synicus Maximus]

25. No child should be let out side without full body armor

and a minimum of two adults to watch after them to insure they can never hurt themselves in any way.

[Avalux]

26. I can say I injured myself on several occassional sledding.

Once, I hit a tree going really fast on a rudder sled, it was icy and I couldn't turn and slammed into the tree; I was on my stomach and went into it head first. No head injury but did get the wind knocked out of me to where I thought I was going to die. I also fell off sled and scraped my face up pretty good; my brother landed on me with his sled when we were going over jumps and I had a gigantic bruise from my knee to my hip.

After these injuries, I learned to NOT do the same stupid shit again, because I didn't want to get hurt again.

Requiring helmets is absurd. I am sick of people trying to legislate my protection.

[Obamanaut]

27. Requiring helmets would be like a regressive tax on the poor. Only

the rich kids whose parents can afford helmets would be able to slip/slide down the slopes.

:sarcasm:

Seriously, just let the kids have fun.

[pipi_k]

28. How the hell did we all manage to survive childhood?

We didn't have bicycle helmets when we were younger.

Our parents gave us baby aspirin when we were sick.

We ate raw cake batter.

We played in piles of leaves and walked on snowbanks and ate dirt and climbed trees.

We went ice skating and sledding without shin guards or helmets. One time I crashed headfirst into a tree...well, it was either the tree or an icy brook, and I chose the tree...

We played in the street and rode our bikes and had crabapple fights with the neighbor kids and walked three miles to the mall and did all sorts of things that exposed us to danger.

We didn't have "playdates" set up for us.

We only had a "real" bath once a week, and the soap wasn't antibacterial. More like Ivory or Palmolive or Lux or Sweetheart...


How did we manage to live through that, I wonder....

[hayu_lol]

29. How many more things can we ban before...

there is nothing left for kids to do to learn about cause and effect? Can/should we ban skiing? Golf?

Helmets on sleds is probably a bad idea. Might result in broken necks from sudden stops.

Collision radar might be a good idea.

[blueamy66]

43. Amen.

I remember the Ivory bubble baths.

[Locrian]

45. duh...

because only those that "survived" are here to post about it?!

;-0

[Odin2005]

30. Oh for fuck's sake...The Nanny State is getting out of hand.

[Individualist]

31. and where does it end?

[NutmegYankee]

32. No kidding! What next, helmets for walking?

[woo me with science]

33. Back away slowly from the Flexible Flyer.

Some Democrats really need to rehearse the following in front of a mirror, five times per day:

Just because you think something's a bad idea does not mean the government should BAN it.

Just because you think something's a good idea does not mean government should ENFORCE it.


/

[WinkyDink]

37. Oh, yes; we were in the ER right and left, in the 50's. Except NOT.

[saras]

38. Indoor kids

The only law that might possibly help is one that requires modern kids to spend gigantically more time playing outside, learning the laws of physics and the limits of their own bodies through personal experience, and I just can't see THAT sort of law getting passed in ANY congress, let alone our current one.

The fact that sledders only sled 'a couple of days a year' is part of the problem. Not that kids are ever perfectly safe, but as someone who grew up outdoors, I had lots of little accidents before I was old and daring enough to have big ones, and the main effect was that I learned not to have big ones. I knew what it was like to run into a tree running 5mph before I had the opportunity to run into a tree on a bike moving 15mph. I learned what it was like to crash a bike going 15mph before I had the opportunity to crash a sled or motorbike going 40mph. I burned myself with little burns before I had the opportunity to start big fires.

I'm currently going back to school and my physics profs as well as myself are shocked and baffled by how little intuitive knowledge kids have of physics, except that if you talk to them it becomes obvious - they haven't thrown balls, rocks, or anything else - they haven't moved things with levers - they haven't fallen down, learned how far they can fall with what injuries, or learned to catch themselves when falling - they haven't lifted and moved heavy stuff - the list goes on and on.

It's easy to go forty mph in a sled, and it's easy to have no grasp at all of how much energy is involved in a body moving at forth mph.

On the other hand, I never learned to downhill ski, partly because every winter, some kid in school who did downhill ski came to school with a broken leg or arm. To them it was all part of the fun... makes me wonder how many undiagnosed concussions there were...

[Lucian]

39. Absolutely not.

I'm tired of the nanny state shit.

[CreekDog]

40. yes, but i don't see helmets made for people's butts

anyone who has been sledding knows why. :o

[knotwurstforware]

46. hell, I almost broke my back

sledding as a child. Didnt stop me from going right back out. We had a hill and right in the middle some kids built a snow "jump". You literally flew in the air the rest of the way down.