Many of these injuries occur when kids climb furniture to retrieve toys or bump into unstable TV bases, causing TVs to topple onto their heads. The heavier the TV, the more potential for damage it can cause, including fractures and intracranial hemorrhages. The TVs were most commonly large and elevated off the ground. Because toddlers are shorter than most TV stands, the child’s head is often the first object that the TV hits when it falls.
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The rate of these injuries has increased in the last decade and is expected to continue rising as TVs are becoming increasingly large and affordable, researchers said.
Ninety-five percent of Canadian homes have televisions, and many are not properly supported on walls or bases. Reports state that at the time of the event children are often in the process of climbing furniture on which the TV set rests.
“My message to parents: don’t wait another day without (putting) your TV in safe place”, she said.
Between 2011 and 2013, more than 15,000 children eacb year on average went to emergency rooms for injuries involving television sets, according to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC).
One two-year-old, who was treated at Sick Kids following submission of the study to the Journal of Neurosurgery: Pediatrics, died after an 81-centimetre (32-inch) TV fell off its stand and fractured the child’s skull.
Dr. Cuismano hopes that more action will be taken to stop head injuries of children for good. The authors provide a thorough review of injury prevention methods, suggest their implementation, and call for future prospective studies created to increase our knowledge of the injury mechanism involved when TV sets topple onto children.
A new study from Canada found that parents and guardians may not be aware of the growing risk to children posed by toppling TV sets. Eighty-four percent of accidents occurred in the home, while three-fourths happened without an adult caregiver present.
“How the WRHA tracks injuries, they maybe haven’t specifically earmarked this is a TV-related injury; probably because it’s not happening as much as it could be in other areas”, said Healthy Living Minister Deanne Crothers. “That is in fact the cause of death in over 95 per cent of kids who die from these injuries”. The ad was in conjunction with its Anchor It! campaign, which aims to help parents avoid potential injuries to their children from fallen furniture or televisions.
Supervising toddlers during television viewing is the number one way to prevent TV toppling injuries.
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For this study, researchers looked at 29 past studies on injuries due to toppling TV sets in children.
