It's never too early to start thinking about childproofing," says Keerti K. Peterson, MD, Pediatrics at ARC Cedar Park Building C. In this video, Dr. Peterson offers tips on making your home safer for your baby.
Dr. Peterson outlines areas of concern, like outlets, cords, window, stairs, and furniture. She says, "You want to enjoy every moment with your baby or your child so if you take these small steps beforehand you can enjoy playing with them in an environment that's safe."
Watch Dr. Peterson's video to get more great tips, or if you prefer, read the transcript below.
It's never too early to start thinking about childproofing your home. You can do it as early as when you're pregnant but definitely want to shoot for prior to baby being mobile so around four to six months.
How can you childproof your home?
So, there's lots of things you should consider when you are child proofing your house. There are risks to baby in all different rooms, so I generally recommend starting room to room, starting with the room you're going to be spending the most time in like the nursery or the bedroom.
- One common thing that we always think about is childproofing for the sockets and the outlets in the house. So, getting guards for the house.
- Cords are not only a strangulation risk but they're also at a risk for electrocuting your baby. So, when possible, try to keep your cords off of the ground level. Another thing you can do is try to keep them twist-tied up so that they're not loose.
- Buckets of water, baby pools, or even a baby bathtub can be a risk for baby to drown in.
- Window safety is something we also have to consider. You want to make sure that baby doesn't have anything they can climb up to get to the window ledge so you should remove furniture and other things that provide access to your baby to get to the window. You want to make sure there's either a window guard or a window stop where the window cannot open more than four inches because babies can fall out even if it opens just four inches.
- There's a guard on the stairs at the top of the stairs but you also want to make sure there's a guard on the bottom. The reason for this is baby can climb up and then fall even if it's just a couple of stairs high.
- Furniture safety and bookshelf safety is also something we have to consider. Bookshelves are things that your baby can climb up onto and furniture can also tip over.
- So, cleaning supplies are always a risk for babies so you want to make sure that you have cabinet fasteners or locks on your cabinets to make sure baby doesn't have access to any of these dangerous chemicals.
- A tip in screening for choking hazards is actually using a toilet paper roll at home. If the toy can fit easily through the toilet paper roll, then you know it's probably a choking hazard for your baby.
You want to enjoy every moment with your baby or your child so if you take these small steps beforehand you can enjoy playing with them in an environment that's safe.
Make an appointment today
If you would like make an appointment with Dr. Peterson, call ARC Cedar Park Building C at 512-259-3467 or make an appointment online.