Safety/booster seats in pediatric motor vehicle crashes: Public health concern

Jeffrey Santos; Areg Grigorian; Morgan Schellenberg; Kazuhide Matsushima; Jeffry Nahmias; Rebecca Barros; Kenji Inaba

doi:10.1016/j.ajem.2023.11.053

Safety/booster seats in pediatric motor vehicle crashes: Public health concern

Am J Emerg Med. 2024 Feb:76:180-184. doi: 10.1016/j.ajem.2023.11.053. Epub 2023 Dec 2.

Authors

Jeffrey Santos¹, Areg Grigorian², Morgan Schellenberg³, Kazuhide Matsushima³, Jeffry Nahmias¹, Rebecca Barros⁴, Kenji Inaba³

Affiliations

¹ University of California, Irvine, Department of Surgery, Division of Trauma, Burns and Surgical Critical Care, Orange, CA, USA.
² University of California, Irvine, Department of Surgery, Division of Trauma, Burns and Surgical Critical Care, Orange, CA, USA. Electronic address: agrigori@uci.edu.
³ Division of Acute Care Surgery, LAC+USC Medical Center, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA.
⁴ Children's Hospital of Orange County, CHOC Medical Group, Orange, CA, USA.

PMID: 38086184
DOI: 10.1016/j.ajem.2023.11.053

Abstract

Introduction: The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) guidelines recommend that children ≤12-years-old with height < 145 cm should use safety/booster seats. However, national adherence and clinical outcomes for eligible children involved in motor vehicle collisions (MVCs) are unknown. We hypothesized that children recommended to use safety/booster seats involved in MVCs have a lower rate of serious injuries if a safety/booster seat is used, compared to children without safety/booster seat.

Methods: This retrospective cohort study queried the 2017-2019 Trauma Quality Improvement Program database for patients ≤12-years-old and <145 cm (recommendation for use of safety/booster seat per American Academy of Pediatrics) presenting after MVC. Serious injury was defined by abbreviated injury scale grade ≥3 for any body-region. High-risk MVC was defined by authors in conjunction with definitions provided by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the American College of Surgeons Committee on Trauma.

Results: From 8259 cases, 41% used a safety/booster seat. There was no difference in overall rate of serious traumatic injuries or mortality (both p > 0.05) between the safety/booster seat and no safety/booster seat groups. In a subset analysis of high-risk MVCs, the overall use of safety/booster seats was 56%. The rate of serious traumatic injury (53.6% vs. 62.1%, p = 0.017) and operative intervention (15.8% vs. 21.6%, p = 0.039) was lower in the safety/booster seat group compared to the no safety/booster seat group.

Conclusions: Despite AAP guidelines, less than half of recommended children in our study population presenting to a trauma center after MVC used safety/booster seats. Pediatric patients involved in a high-risk MVC suffered more serious injuries and were more likely to require surgical intervention without a safety/booster seat. A public health program to increase adherence to safety/booster seat use within this population appears warranted.

Keywords: Booster seat; Motor vehicle collision; Pediatric car seat; Pediatric trauma; Safety seat.

MeSH terms

Accidents, Traffic* / prevention & control
Child
Child Restraint Systems*
Humans
Motor Vehicles
Public Health
Retrospective Studies