Use of Child Booster Seats in Motor Vehicles Following a Community Campaign

Abstract

OTOR VEHICLE COLLIsions remain the leading cause of death for children aged 4 to 8 years. 1 Booster seats are more effective than seat belts at reducing the risk of injury for these older children. 2 Nonetheless, only an estimated 6% to 19% of 4-to 8-year-old children currently ride in booster seats, while the majority use only an adult seat belt. 3-5 To date, there are no published trials of community interventions to increase booster seat use. In 1999, we began a 2-year community campaign to increase booster seat use in King County, Washington. This report describes the effectiveness of the campaign in increasing observed booster seat use. METHODS Study Design We conducted a prospective, nonrandomized, controlled trial to evaluate the community intervention. Booster seat use in each community was observed at baseline just before beginning the intervention, and then observations were repeated 15 months later. Four communities in the greater Seattle, Wash, area served as intervention sites, comprising about 240000 people. Eight communities in Portland, Ore, and Spo-kane, Wash, served as control sites. These communities were approximately matched on household per capita income and population size (TABLE 1), 6,7 and were chosen because they represented distinct neighborhoods with clear geographic boundaries. Booster Seat Campaign The campaign targeted both parents and children. It sought to increase parental awareness of the need for booster seats, reduce the motivational and financial barriers to purchasing a seat, and reinforce booster seat use through public health messages delivered from many different sources. Campaign messages were developed based on the Precede-Proceed model of behavioral change, identifying predisposing, enabling, and

Community-based programs to promote car seat restraints in children 0–16 years – a systematic review

“…Four studies were designed with selected control communities matched on demographic characteristics (Ebel et al, 2003;Guyer et al, 1989;Davidson et al, 1994;Decina et al, 1994) two studies compared the results from the intervention community to the rest of the geographical region (Istre et al, 2002) or country (Ekman et al, 2001) and a further two studies were designed with the intervention community acting as an historical control (Durkin et al, 1999;Roberts et al, 1988). Meta-analysis was not possible due to the diversity of the independent and outcome variables in each of the studies reviewed.…”

Avaliação do conhecimento dos pais sobre segurança no transporte de crianças em veículos automotores e motocicletas

“…Another important finding was that only 47% of the respondents always transport children in accordance to the answer given, and only 2.5% had correct answers for the four questions about restraints used for children in motor vehicles. In developed countries, studies confirmed the importance of educational strategies to minimize risks (6,8,11,27) . Therefore, traffic education should begin in infancy, in the family, so that, based on the example of people with whom the child lives, the percentage of individuals that transport children in vehicles adequately increases (5,11) .…”

“…Although legislation requires the use of these seats in Brazil, they are not used all the time, or are used incorrectly. Only 6 to 9% of children 4 to 8 years old use a booster seat when transported in motor vehicles, and for all the others, only the vehicle's seat belt is used (8) . Chart 1 shows the types of child seats recommended for each age and weight, as well as the recommendations of the Brazilian Association of Traffic Medicine (Abramet) for the correct use of these restraints (7) .…”

Disparities in Age-Appropriate Child Passenger Restraint Use Among Children Aged 1 to 12 Years

“…This warrants investigation because day care settings have been sites in successful child passenger safety programs. [41][42][43] Racial differences in sources of information that were predictive of ageappropriate restraint use (eg, instruction manuals and the Internet/Web) may signal differential access to certain resources. The accessibility, quality, and content of information used by parents to guide their child passenger restraint choices requires further exploration.…”