Common Causes of Playground Injuries

Falls

Falls from the equipment to the ground are the top cause for childhood emergency room visits due to playground-related injuries. Children fall because they slip, lose their grip, or lose their balance while playing on monkey bars, swings, slides, merry-go-rounds, and seesaws. So making sure the playground has proper FallZone Safety Surfacing with a 3rd party tested shock absorbing safety base will help prevent a lot of these injuries like the FallZone Poured-in-Place playground safety surface system.

Even something as simple as the drawstrings from a hooded sweatshirt can catch on a piece of playground equipment and lead to a fall. Often children are hurt not only by the fall, but by being struck by the equipment as they fall.

In a natural effort to protect themselves, children will often fall on an outstretched hand and break the bones involving the elbow. This type of elbow fracture (supracondylar fracture of the humerus) is the most common injury that requires a trip to the operating room for treatment.

Slides

Many injuries also happen on slides. One study found a relationship between shinbone (tibia) fractures and young children going down a slide on the lap of an adult. In many of these cases, the child’s leg became stuck, but the adult and child could not stop moving down the slide. In other cases, the child’s leg became twisted during the ride down.

Other Causes

A smaller number of playground injuries occur on teeter-totters and seesaws. To lesser degrees, injuries result from contact with sharp edges of equipment, impact with stationary equipment, and falling after being struck with some type of equipment other than what the child was playing on-for example, walking past a moving swing. Playgrounds with poor maintenance and improper playground surfacing present extra opportunities for injuries from trash, rusty play equipment or damaged fall surfaces.

For more information how to prevent injures on the playground go to www.fallzonesafetysurfacing.com