Minnesota HealthSolutions Corporation — Department of Health and Human Services SBIR Phase I: NICHD

Description

Project Summary Abstract Minnesota HealthSolutions CorporationMHSproposes to develop an innovative all new convertible child safety seatChild safety seats are installed in vehicles by properly attaching and tensioning the main anchorage pointsProper use of the attachments is extremely important as these significantly reduce child head injuries in motor vehicle crashesAttachments are inconveniently located on child safety seats and difficult to useSeveral large studies have observed that onlytoof children are correctly harnessed into correctly installed seatsImproper use of child restraints substantially reduces their effectiveness and is a major public health concernThe proposed child safety seat will be extremely easy to use and will dramatically increase the visibility and usability of the attachmentsWe hypothesize that a child safety seat that provides a convenienteasy to use attachment will significantly improve the rate of proper child safety seat usage and reduce vehicle crash related child injuries and deathsAn interdisciplinary team of researchers has been assembled to definebuildand evaluate a prototype systemThe production development will be completed in a rigorous quality controlled design and testing process to ensure a safe and effective product is produced Project Narrative Motor vehicle crashes are the leading cause of unintentional morbidity and mortality among children in the United States and a leading cause of brain injuryA total ofchildren agedyears or younger died as a result of unintentional motor vehicle traffic crashes fromand hundreds of thousands more were injuredWe aim to develop a significantly improved child safety seat top tether system to better protect children riding in motor vehicles