Being a parent of four children, I can certainly identify with the stresses that come with the start of a new school year. One of those stresses is making sure everyone gets out the door on time in the morning and arrives safely at school. The Calgary Police Service would like to take this opportunity to remind students and parents about the importance of traffic safety.
Open windows are a sign of summer-warm weather, a nice breeze. But they can also be an unintended hazard for young children with natural curiosity. That is why The City of Calgary has teamed up with health care practitioners not only to educate Canadians about the risk of open windows, but to change the national building code to make windows safer. “Every year across Canada, over 420 young children are treated in emergency departments because they have fallen out of second-storey windows in their homes,” says Civitarese, The City of Calgary’s chief building official. “At least 50 of those victims are children who receive medical treatment in Alberta, alone.”
A concussion is a mild brain injury resulting from a jarring of the brain following a head injury. Head injuries can result from: a direct blow to the head, a hit to the upper body, or a rapid accelerating/decelerating force on the body. These forces cause the brain to move inside the skull. Concussion symptoms can occur even without a loss of consciousness (fainting/blackout) and can last minutes or hours to days and months. Concussions are a brain injury that will not be seen on x-rays, CT scans, or MRIs. They can affect the way a child may think, behave, and remember things.
With summer right around the corner, Calgarians will soon be looking to take their family activities outdoors. If your family is planning to go floating, boating, or kayaking down the Bow and Elbow rivers, or enjoy a community lake this summer, don’t forget that where there’s water, there’s risk.
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