Because data indicates a considerable risk of major and minor injury and even death from the use of infant walkers -- as well as no clear benefit from their use -- The American Academy of Pediatrics Committee on Injury and Poison Prevention recommended a ban on the manufacture and sale of mobile infant walkers this week. Dr. Robert Cordes, a pediatrician for the Geisinger Health System, believes it's about time.
A member of the academy, Cordes just treated an 11-month old youngster who suffered injuries when his walker rolled down the stairs last weekend. While he successfully treated the injuries, which were not life-threatening, it reinforced the risks that these walkers pose to their infant occupants.
The numbers The American Academy of Pediatrics released with its proposed ban are staggering and certainly support the recommendation. In 1999, an estimated 8,800 children younger than 15 months were treated in hospital emergency departments in the United States for injuries associated with infant walkers. Thirty-four infant walker-related deaths were reported from 1973 through 1998. The vast majority of injuries occur from falls down stairs, and head injuries are common.
Cordes has urged even prenatal parents to avoid infant walkers for some time now, and the effort has paid off -- producing just two walker-related injuries in the last two years, including last weekend's.
"They (infant walkers) have always been a problem. Why the academy's announcement was timed for this week, I'm not sure. But pediatricians have always discouraged their use," says Cordes. "Basically, they're (walkers) hazardous in terms of physical injuries. They're mostly head injuries when kids fall down steps and tip over in them -- even on flat surfaces. Because they (infants) can go backward in them, there are other problems. They may hit something and it may fall on them, and they can't get out of the way.
"The greatest danger is that you also take a child who shouldn't be mobile and you make them mobile, so they now have access to some things they shouldn't have access too -- like poisons."
But aside from the health dangers, infant walkers actually inhibit the developmental skills most parents believe they are designed to enhance -- walking.
"Walkers actually delay their (an infant's) development," says Cordes. "Because a baby isn't supporting his or her own weight (in the walkers), they don't develop the same type of muscular development to master walking as other children not using them. In a walker, they (the infant) can't also see down to the floor to see how they need to move their body to walk. So there really are no benefits."
While stationary activity centers are being promoted as a safer alternative to mobile infant walkers by The American Academy of Pediatrics, Cordes also warns parents to limit their child's time in those devices. They also don't allow infants to support themselves, or see the floor either -- meaning some of the same developmental issues exist, even if they are safer because of the restricted mobility.
Mobility, or lack there of, is a key to the safety of a young child.
"I think there's evidence that indicates that babies can move three feet per second in them (infant walkers). Parents who use them need to consider that in two seconds, their child's already six feet away from them. In another step, now they're nine feet away and into trouble already," says Cordes. "For parents who use them, they need to realize that people have to be right there to avoid accidents. Sometimes, people are looking for you to advise them on the right way to use things (like walkers), and they look for you to rationalize for them on using them. I simply cannot condone their (infant walkers) use and give parents permission to use them."
Cordes believes The American Academy of Pediatrics' recommended ban on the devices will help deter more parents from using mobile infant walkers, although he says that "it was pretty much common knowledge among pediatricians to not to recommend using them." Most had been counseling against them for some time, he reports.
If you'd like to contact Cordes, please call him at (570) 200-7533, or you may set up and interview through Mark Davis, manager of media and community relations at Geisinger, by calling (570) 825-1070, or e-mailing him at [email protected].
Feel free to also call me at (814) 867-1963, or e-mail me back if you have additional questions or needs. Dick Jones Communications assists Geisinger -- which provides health care services to 31 counties and nearly two million patients in Pennsylvania -- with its public affairs work.
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