Safe Ride 4 Kids Launches New ebook "The Truth About Driving During Pregnancy"
denver, CO. (PRWEB) May 01, 2015 -- Safe Ride 4 Kids Launches new ebook "The Truth About Driving During Pregnancy" The ebook Reveals the risks every pregnant woman needs to know about driving to keep herself and her baby as safe as Possible when driving while pregnant.
A study by the University of Michigan estimates that about 170,000 car crashes in the U.S. each year involve pregnant women. On average, 2.9 percent of women report being hurt in a car accident during pregnancy. Based on an average of 4 million babies born a year, that's 116,000 crashes where a mom to be is injured.
A range of studies estimate an average of 3,000 pregnancies are lost every year due to a car crash. In comparison that is 80 times more than the highly publicized hot car deaths at an average of 38 a year and 7.5 times the average number of 405 children from birth to age four who die in car crashes every year.
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) states that auto accidents are the single largest cause of death for pregnant women. Even when you think you are doing everything right, there is still a risk. Some of that risk, ironically, comes from the seat belt itself.
Kathleen Klinich, a researcher at the University of Michigan, stated the anatomy of pregnant women while seated in automotive posture poses a unique challenge to restraint designers because of difficulty positioning the lap belt and close proximity to the steering wheel and airbag module.
While it is three times safer for a pregnant women to use a seat belt than to not use one, the very thing that is designed to hold her in the car and keep her from hitting the interior of the vehicle poses a risk to her and the pregnancy. The current seat belt configuration is designed to engage the hip bones to keep the occupant in the seat during a crash. The challenge is the pregnancy is often forward of the hip bones so the seat belt has to compress into the pregnancy to engage the hip bones and restrain the occupant.
The most common and most life-threatening injury caused to pregnant women during a car crash is placenta abruption. Placenta abruption can cause the placenta to be prematurely detached from the uterine wall, which cuts off blood flow to the placenta. That’s a delicate attachment, and it doesn’t take a lot of force to detach the placenta. This is, obviously, a critical medical condition that can be fatal not only to the baby but also place the mother’s health in serious and potentially life-threatening danger.
Expecting moms don’t know the risks of driving and it is generally not a topic of conversation with her OB/GYN because the professionals may not even know the risks. Safe Ride 4 Kids believes it’s an important subject for health care providers to talk about with their expecting patients.
There are a few quick tips that expecting moms can follow to help keep themselves and their babies safer in the car during pregnancy. Some of those tips include:
• If you are feeling nauseated or tired, try to put off driving or have someone else drive you.
• When you have to be the driver, move your seat as far back as is comfortable. Try to position yourself so that your breastbone is at least 10 inches from the steering wheel.
• Use a crash-tested maternity seat belt like the Tummy Shield to reposition the lap belt. The Tummy Shield is proven to make the seat belt more comfortable for pregnant woman, therefore increasing the likelihood they will use the seat belt, and it offers the additional safety of not having the lap portion of the seat belt go across the pregnancy.
“We were in a car accident three days before I delivered my baby girl. We weren't seriously injured, but she was born with a black eye and bruised face from the seat belt. This product would've prevented that,” said Brandy Perry Pruitt, a new mother in Louisiana.
Please visit the website http://TummyShield.com for more information on safe driving while pregnant or to download the new ebook.
Greg Durocher, Safe Ride 4 Kids, http://www.saferide4kids.com, +1 602-421-7233, [email protected]
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