Choosing and Using a Car Seat
General Guidelines
When choosing and using seats, follow these guidelines:
There are several kinds of child safety seats. Some seats are made only for infants; convertibles may be adjusted to fit children from birth to age 4. Safety boosters are for children who have outgrown regular safety seats but are not yet tall enough for regular shoulder straps.
For infants: Infants under 27 inches tall, less than 1-year-old and weighing less than 20 pounds should ride facing the rear in a semi-reclined (45-degree angle) infant or convertible safety seat. Never place a rear-facing infant seat in the forward position.
For children over 20 pounds and at least 1-year-old: Once your child reaches 20 pounds or 27 inches, is 1-year-old and can sit up by herself, you can move her to a forward-facing seat. Never put a toddler in a safety belt alone; the belts will not fit correctly.
For children between 40 and 80 pounds: When your child reaches 40 inches tall or approximately 40 pounds, you can move her into a booster seat. Booster seats help elevate a child so that the seat beat falls across his chest. Follow manufacturer's instruction for installations and use. A child should stay in a booster seat until she reaches 4 feet 9 inches in height and weighs about 80 pounds. Then she can start using regular seat belts without a booster.
Many kids, however, outgrow boosters when they are still too small for the lap and shoulder belts to fit properly and comfortably. Fortunately, products are available that help solve the problem. One is a padded nylon sleeve through which you thread the shoulder belt and reposition it. Another device is a two-foot-long slotted plastic bar that also repositions and secures the lap and shoulder belt. Both are widely available. Some car manufacturers are also addressing the issue and offer seat belts with clips that reposition the shoulder belt away from a child's face and neck. In addition to choosing the right restraint, you must use it properly and make sure it is in good condition.
Seat Guidelines
Make sure the seat itself is safe. Designs have been modified and improved, but products continue to be recalled. Every safety seat made for sale in the U.S. today must be crash-tested and labeled with the name of the manufacturer, the date made, and a statement that safety seats may or may not be safe. Using a new car seat is safest. If you must use a used car seat, make sure it was never in a crash, is in good repair with no cracks, is less than ten years old and preferably less than five, and has all of its parts, including its instruction booklet. To check out which seats have been recalled, visit the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration web site at www.nhtsa.dot.gov.
Install the car seat according to the manufacturer's recommendations. Keep the manufacturer's instructions with the car seat, perhaps in the glove compartment. Make sure the seat is compatible with your automobile or make the necessary adjustments suggested by the manufacturer. This is essential; some researchers estimate that as many as 80 percent of car seats are installed improperly.
Make sure the seat belt will hold the seat firmly in place. Some harness belts, particularly those designed to allow nonabrupt movement, require installation of a locking clip. Otherwise, a sudden swerve could cause the child seat to tip over. Install the clip if necessary.
Always place your child in the back seat. Front passenger air bags can kill a child; even if the air bags are disabled or your car does not have air bags, the back seat is the safest place for your child to ride.
For any questions about safety seats, call the DOT Auto-Safety Hotline at (800) 424-9393 or (888) 327-4236, or visit www.nhtsa.dot.gov.
From The Parents Answer Book: From Birth Through Age Five, by the editors of Parents Magazine. Copyright © 2000 by Roundtable Press and G+J USA Publishing.