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Courtesy Candice Johnson
Candice Johnson, 34, of Sinking Spring, Pa., cradles daughter Annika last November, about a month after the child suffered a skull fracture when Johnson fell carrying her down the stairs. It was a busy morning trying to get Liliana, 6, off to school.
For weeks after the accident, Candice Johnson couldn’t sleep. Over and over, she kept reliving the moment last October when she dropped her 9-month-old daughter down a flight of stairs in their Pennsylvania home.
“I kept seeing us falling,” she said. “I was carrying her down the steps and my flip-flop broke.”
Johnson slipped and Annika flew out of her mother’s arms, striking her head. Doctors at a trauma center diagnosed a skull fracture and bleeding on her brain. Five months later, the child has recovered, but for Johnson, taking the stairs will never be the same.
“It was an accident, but it’s hard,” said Johnson, 34, of Sinking Spring, Pa. “You can’t help but blaming yourself.”
That may be true, but there’s plenty of blame to go around. New research shows that a child younger than 5 is treated for a stair-related injury every six minutes in a U.S. emergency department, on average, and being carried on the stairs accounts for nearly a quarter of stair injuries in children younger than 1.
Read more: TODAY on how to make stairs safer
“We were surprised by the numbers,” said Dr. Gary A. Smith, director of the center for injury research and policy for Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus, Ohio. “It sends a wake-up call to all of us.”
In the first nationally representative study of stair injuries in young kids, Smith and his colleagues found that nearly 932,000 children younger than 5 were hurt in stair accidents in the U.S. in the decade from 1999 through 2008. On average, that’s more than 93,000 kids a year, or about 46.5 injuries for every 10,000 children under age 5, according to the study published in the journal Pediatrics.
The good news is, the number of injuries each year fell during that period, dropping by 11.6 percent by 2008, mostly because of a sharp decline in stair injuries tied to baby walkers, which once hurt some 25,000 children a year.
Voluntary safety standards enacted in the mid-1990s and wider awareness about the dangers of baby walkers helped fuel that decline, cutting those injuries to about 1,300 a year, Smith said.
Photo courtesy Kate Canterbury
Kate Canterbury's twins, Evie and Jane, were 18 months old when she tripped while walking downstairs in a three-story condo.
But the bad news is, nearly 90,000 kids still were hurt in stair accidents in 2008, largely because of preventable factors linked to stairway design, consumer awareness and parental education.
'Incredibly awful'
Kate Canterbury, 36, of Columbia, Mo., blames the steep stairs in a three-story condo in St. Paul, Minn., for her tumble three years ago while carrying her twin daughters, Evie and Jane, who were then 18 months old.
"It was incredibly awful because I knew in that split second that I had to let one go or all of us would fall," Canterbury recalled.
It wasn't a matter of choice, but momentum. She dropped the twin in her left arm, which was pointing downstairs. The toddler fell while Canterbury and the other twin slid down the steps.
"She immediately started crying, so I knew she was OK," Canterbury says. "I just felt so guilty for letting go of her."
She's not certain and doesn't want to say which of the twins, now 5, she actually dropped. "I don't want them coming back at me, saying, 'You loved her more,'" Canterbury said with a laugh.
She's just relieved -- and feels lucky -- that no one was hurt.
About three-quarters of kids who were hurt on stairs suffered injuries to the head and neck, researchers found, and nearly 3 percent of the children were hospitalized.
It’s not clear how many children may have died as a result of the injuries because the data obtained from the National Electronic Injury Surveillance System, or NEISS, don’t track deaths, Smith said.
Most of the harm, about 35 percent, came from soft-tissue injuries, followed by cuts, about 26 percent, and closed-head injuries, about 20 percent. Fractures, dislocations and other injuries accounted for the rest, the study showed.
Almost all of the injuries, nearly 95 percent, occurred at home, and about 88 percent of the injuries, or 817,000, were caused by simple falls. Still, children jumping or riding toys downstairs accounted for 2.6 percent of injuries, and another 2.7 percent were still hurt while using baby walkers.
“It’s a mixed message because mobile baby walkers are still sold in stores,” said Smith, noting that studies have shown the walkers not only are dangerous, they also delay children’s progress in walking and learning. “It’s a device that really has no redeeming value,” Smith added.
Particularly worrisome, he said, were the injuries to babies being carried on stairs. About 33,500 injuries, or a quarter of those in kids younger than 1, occurred when the child was being carried on stairs by a parent or other caretaker. Those youngsters were three times more likely to be hospitalized than kids injured in other ways.
“We do live in a multi-tasking world,” Smith said. “If you have to take your child up or down the stairs, only the child should be in your arms.”
That’s not the only precaution for avoiding stair accidents. Smith says any home in the U.S. where young children live or visit should have sturdy, wall-mounted gates at the top and at least pressure-mounted gates at the bottom of the flights.
“[Houses] should come built that way and then parents can take them off,” he said.
Stairs themselves should be constructed to minimize the chance of falling and banisters should allow people to get a good grip in case they trip.
But the biggest boon would be increased awareness about how common -- and how dangerous -- stair accidents can be, Smith said.
“I’ve worked for decades in hospital emergency departments and what I hear over and over again is: ‘I can’t believe this happened to my child,’” he said.
In Candice Johnson’s case, she no longer wears shoes inside the house and she has a basket on the stairs for carrying multiple items.
“When I’m walking down the steps, I take them one at a time,” she said. “I try not to be bringing other stuff while I’m holding her.”
Most of all, though, Johnson says she tries to slow down. On the morning of the accident, she was rushing, trying to get her older daughter, Liliana, 6, off to school.
“Be sure that you’re paying attention,” Johnson said. “If I had given myself a second to take a deep breath, maybe I would have been able to catch myself.”
NBC's Jeff Rossen reports on the common defects in home staircases that safety experts say can cause serious falls and shows families what they can do to protect themselves.
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What's the best age to raise kids? Older parents weigh in
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Lingering shortage of ADHD drugs unravels lives
Leave a Comment:
Its obvious Americans are a bunch of clucking futzes. Obummer should ban stairs immediately due to stairs being unconstitutional.
No, just use hand rails and take your time in proper shoes or get help. Simple rules.
Life is dangerous. If it's not stairs, it's driving hazards.
Then there are drunks, pills, incompetent doctors, kitchen knives and guns.
I could go on.
Sure guns are dangerous too, so let's let the toddler play with a loaded gun.
If you don't already, GET CARPETING or a RUNNER on your stairs. After slipping a few times before my child was born, I wasn't going to take any chances.
Stairs don't maim and kill people, steps do! Out law them all. Make people get permits to own. Make people get classes on safe use. Where is my government on protecting me from such a thing?
Make builders build good stairs with a modest slope and longer runners, not so steep. Good handrails and non slip treads.
After I had my baby and we lived upstairs at my dad's house, I was always super cautious when going up or down stairs, fearing I would drop my baby. When she was 1, my dad was the one who slipped at the top of a stairwell and fell. The result: paralyzed from the neck down and he died from complications of the spinal cord injury 2 years later at 57 years old. Accidents happen-life isn't always fair. Period. You don't always have to blame someone or something.
Use hand rails always
Shoddy cheap azzed engineering designs. Stairs should be in tiers so that a human cannot fall completely down them. I would never have those lethal 20-60 ft stairs in a home. Humans always trip and fall. Duh.
and sometimes get pushed by evil step nomes... hmmm
I think we should ban gravity. It seems to be at the root of many accidents.
Stupidity seems to be at the root for a whole lot more. Flip Flops ? Stairs ? DUH !!
I understand many of these accidents truly occur and they are just accidents or the result of poor judgement and can happen at any time. (I've been lucky with my kids and stairs) But, in the past, how many people covered up child abuse by saying "the child fell down the stairs", when the parent actually did it? Especially when they were little and the parent "fell with the child". Don't be naive and think that somehow child are negotiating stairs better now, or that parenting is better now and we're teaching our children how to climb stairs appropriately. Research has shown in the past that a lot of "crib death" babies had actually been smothered by mothers, due to stress from lack of support/post-partum issues that were not acknowledged and addressed at the time. Maybe stair injuries have decreased because couples can control their family size more easily now, and it's ok for women to ask for help.
I taught my children at a very early age (once they were walking) to stop at the top of a staircase and sit down. My kids all learned to go down a staircase on their bottoms until they were able to *pattern* walk (one foot and then the other). I can still remember when I was upset with one of the kids and he ran. Once he got to the stairs, he sat down and slid to the bottom. At the bottom, he stood up and grinned - the whole thing was so hysterical that I couldn't help but smile and forget why he was in trouble.
Elderly people should do the same thing once they are unstable on their feet. One of the reasons, I started my children off by using their backsides to go down a flight of stairs was because my grandmother started to go down stairs in her home by sitting down and kind of sliding/sitting as she got up in years. In those days, we could not afford to buy the special chair guides for staircases. Obviously, she did not go up and down several times a day, but just practicing safety seems to work out well.
Good ideas
I teach child safety.
Three rules..
1. Make the environment safe
2. Supervise
3. Teach safety rules.
Staris ....cordon off.
Everyone, always use handrails, always.
Never wear high hills ladies at work
Rubber grip on stair treads.
Don't take heavy items down stairs, get a pro.
These rules are to be enforced until the age of 55 years.
high hills? I didn't know people could wear land formations.
When I was raised, my parents used an iron crib that had been used for all of the children on my mom's side of the family since my grandpa was born. We all survived even though it was probably not up to "code" for the 1980's.
The old generation is/was a lot tougher than this coddled generation! Parents are to blame, but so are companies marketing to produce this hysteria that our children are going to die from germs, etc.
So what if this woman wore flip flops while carrying her child down the stairs. Statistically, how likely is this to happen as is documented in other cases? 1 in 100, 1 in 1000, 1 in 10,000, 1 in 100,000, 1 in 1,000,000, 1 in 1,000,000,000??? If people want to be over-protective, statistically you are probably safer walking down stairs in flip flops with your child than you are driving them ANYWHERE!
It's not the young kids that are getting injured on stairs, the older and elderly are falling too with serious injuries. After falling down stairs several times my next home definitely became a single story with no more bumpy bounces tumbling down stairs on my head and butt.
The scary part is it happens so quickly, you're already at the bottom wondering how you got there so fast with lumps and bumps.
i slipped on my mother-in-laws stairs while carrying my almost (at the time) 4year old. It resulted in a broken leg for her. The bad part was when she was asked what happened she would tell everyone "My mommy mad me fall down the stairs." I swear the only thing that saved me from Child Protective Services was the fact I had a briuse from hip to calf because I went down too.
Meanwhile, somewhere in California, a bill has been introduced to ban stairs. Legislators to the rescue!!
Sad but true.
I'll bet you don't know that many new houses with stairs are built with too steep a rise vs run ratio.
You do understand that don't you?
Personally, I would love for the government to not mandate or inform dumb ditto heads of the right about anything. I would love for us to pass along all the spoiled food and milk and ecoli and dangerous drugs to red neck Republicans and let liberals get safety information alone.
Unfortunately, we live with dumb red neck Republicans on the road speeding, DUI, throwing lit cigarettes out the window and other areas where what they do affects us.
The dumb red necks used to smoke all over us and start hotel fires by smoking in bed and the entire hotel had to be evacuated.
So, until we get seperate countries try and heed some safety rules.
Satire confirmed with a rabid, hyperbole-filled, seething reply.
Point. Set. Match.
three ways to stop this 1 ban flip flops 2 ban stairs 3 ban kids
Four ways...............Ban dumb Republicans from having kids and working with us
Send a wake up call? Great more liberals trying to solve something that can never be solved and ruining life for everyone in the process. The only wake up call is to pay attention when going up and down the stairs. Anything beyond that is unecessary.
No, you supervise children and help old folks and put up hand rails and warn folks to not wear high heels at work. Called saving a million dollar healthcare bill for disability from a fall. Go listen to Rush or dummy Beck, they almost graduated from high school.
These three are personal responsibility issues, and without a personal government supervisor for everyone, no kid is going to be supervised every second and they will goof around on stairs and fall down, old people will still try to have their bedroom upstairs and have to face stairs multiple times per day, and women will still wear high heels when they dress up and occasionally have to contend with stairs.
Ban all Stairways!! NOW!! Lobby in Congress for subsidies to install padded elevators in everyone's home!!! Enact laws to prohibit new building of more than one story!!! Run while you STILL CAN!!!!
No matter who you are, how rich or poor, race, sex or color....at some point GRAVITY SUCKS.
and where would you consider the danger in stairs when your alcoholic mother throws you down them?
Ban people and problem solved.
Ban Republicans and problem solved.
I'm surprised some dumb-a** government official hasn't tried to pass legislation banning stairs. Or maybe it's still tied up in committee. They will probably mandate elevators in all houses with two or more floors. Hell, they might even mandate them in one story homes in case you ever want to put in a second floor.
No, but they do have hand rails and non slip treads and for Republicans instructions to not wear high hill shoes, run up and down stairs or wear flip flps.
Ban stairs now!!!
No, no, breed smarter children now!!!
No, no, nerf the world!!!
Jeez what a stupid story.
Not stupid hoss. Many children and adults die as a result of stairs. In a hospital we are the ones listening to how stupid you were and accidents just happen. No, people cause accidents through stupidity.
I can think of two reasons why stair injury reports are on the rise:
a) greater parental awareness of the risk of injury with a fall- especially head injury, requiring a trip to Urgent Care/ED for evaluation and
b) the increase of multi-story condos and townhouses in suburban areas where 1-story ranch-type houses used to reign. Because of their relative affordability, this is the housing of choice for young families and older adults who are downsizing. Unfortunately, idiot builders don't realize that these are exactly the buyers who need one bedroom, and preferably a bathroom with bathing facilities, on the main floor.
excellent points
You can't fix stupid!
"Fell down the stairs." Uh huh, sure. And every seven minutes one is treated for "walking into a door."
Not same. stair falls equal broke neck, paralyze, broke hip. Now dumb red necks are like house pets..you just let them fall and die.
OMG!!!!!!!....call your congressman!
We need a law banning stairs!! ALL buildings must remove stairs and replace with elevators!
.....or dumbass parents can watch their kids better