By Deborah Tillman, MSN, ARNP, A-GNP-C
Most of us have been spending the majority of our time at home these days along with the whole family. Now might be a great time to create or update your home’s safety plan. If you don’t already have such a plan, putting one together and adding needed safety features may be welcome activities, especially if you’ve run out of fresh ideas after watching Frozen 2 for the tenth time.
Falls:
Trips and falls can happen to anyone of any age around the home. Risk of these can be substantially reduced with a few simple activities and additions to the home:
- Clear your floors of small and loose items such as pet bowls, toys, electrical cords, throw rugs; anything that might slip away when stepped on or someone could catch with their foot and lose balance.
- Arrange or remove furniture so there’s a wide walking path in all rooms, especially those leading towards exits to the outside.
- Essential items should be placed where they can be easily reached by family members that may need them.
- Add grab bars inside and outside of your bathtub or shower, and next to the toilet.
- Add railings on both sides of stairs, and make sure stairs, hallways and any transitions in floor height have good lighting.
- Outdoors areas should be well lit, with walkways smooth and free of puddles so mud and ice can not form.
Fire:
Nine in 10 structure fires occur in the home and more than 8 in 10 fire-related deaths resulting from home fires. Only 1 in 5 parents regularly practice fire escape plans at home, and only half of parents report their children know what to do in the event of a fire. When a fire does happen at home, children can become frightened and hide. By educating and practicing with our children for these types of emergencies, we can save lives and even have a little fun while doing it. Kids of all ages may find this a fun diversion and it can be as simple or as elaborate as you wish:
- Have family members draw out on a sheet of paper your house with outside exits anyone can use clearly marked.
- Pick a family safety spot that’s near your home, yet a safe distance away, for everyone to meet up in the event of an emergency.
- Press the smoke alarm test button with all family members present so they know what the beep sounds like.
- Then press the smoke alarm test button again, this time everyone walks to the safety spot in two minutes or less (use a timer). Two minutes is how much time a family has to safely exit the house in the event of a fire.
- For children under six, assign an adult to help them during the beeping sound and reaching the family safety spot activities.
- Consider posting your house plan (with exits and family safety spot clearly marked) for everyone to see, like any good work of art.
(Sources: National Safety Council, 2020; IAFF, 2018)
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