'Use rear-facing car seats up to age of 4', warn doctors

By DAILY MAIL REPORTER
Updated:


Parents should keep children in rear-facing car seats up to the age of four, say doctors.

Switching to forward-facing ones before that is dangerous and could result in spinal injury in an accident.

There is compelling evidence that children's lives are being put at risk even though parents believe they are doing the best for them, doctors claim.

Mother and baby driving in car with baby in front seat baby carrier

Safest: Parents should keep young children in rear-facing car seats for as long as possible

They have published an alert on the British Medical Journal website (bmj.com) advising parents to keep young children in rear-facing seats for as long as possible.

Dr Elizabeth Watson, a GP, and Dr Michael Monteiro, who specialises in facial injuries at the Royal Surrey County Hospital, Guildford, say several studies show this is safest.

Many parents switch babies from rear-facing seats to a forward-facing one when they reach 20lb. 

That could be as early as eight months of age for an average boy.

But data from Sweden, where using rear-facing seats up to the age of four is common, shows children who died in accidents restrained in forward-facing seats may have survived if they had been travelling in the other type.

A U.S. study concluded that rear-facing seats were more effective in protecting children aged 0-23 months in a crash.

Recent crash tests have also reported that rear-facing seats resulted in significantly lower neck and chest injuries.

Unlike forward-facing seats, rear-facing ones keep the head, neck and spine fully aligned so the crash forces are distributed over all of these body areas, say the doctors.

Children in accidents while belted up in forward-facing seats are more vulnerable to excessive stretching of the spinal cord, which may even be torn apart.

Dr Watson said many parents don't know that rear-facing seats for toddlers exist.

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