Home Accidents in Childhood

Abstract

THE following and many similar headlines startle parents and physicians daily: "Girl Dead, Boy Blinded by Antifreeze"; "Three Small Children Perish in Home Fire"; and "Boy, Two, Dies in Two-Story Fall." To the physician, who today can usually successfully treat his child patients for such serious illnesses as meningitis, erythroblastosis fetalis and dehydration, it is particularly frustrating to be faced with the death or serious injury of one of these children from an accident; yet except for the first year of life accidents are the single greatest cause of death during childhood¹ (Table 1).In 1956 accidents caused over 10,000 . . .