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Medicine Talk
Health
Clinic
Baby Safety Checklist
In the Bedroom
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Put your baby to sleep on her back or side in a crib with a firm, flat
mattress and no soft bedding underneath her. Follow this advice to
reduce the risk of suffocation and Sudden Infant Death Syndrome
(SIDS). To prevent suffocation, never put babies to sleep on
adult beds.
Make sure your baby’s crib is sturdy and has no loose or missing
hardware. This will prevent babies from suffocating or strangling by
becoming trapped between broken crib parts.
Never place your baby’s crib or furniture near a window blind or
curtain cords. This will prevent babies from strangling on the loop of
the cord. To prevent falls, keep children away from windows.
In the Bathroom
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Keep medicines and cleaning products in containers with safety caps
and locked away from children. This will prevent children from
being poisoned.
Always check bath water temperature with your wrist or elbow before
putting your baby in to bathe. This will prevent bums to a baby’s
delicate skin.
Never, ever, leave your child alone in the bathtub or near any water.
This will prevent children from drowning. In addition, keep children
away from all standing water, including water in toilets, five-gallon
buckets, and pools.
In the Kitchen
Don’t leave your baby alone in a highchair; always use all safety
straps. This will prevent injuries and deaths from the baby climbing
out, falling, or sliding under the tray. Be sure to use safety straps in
strollers and baby swings.
Z Use your stove’s back burners. Keep pot handles turned to the back
of the stove. This will prevent deaths and injuries from burns. In
addition, keep children away from tablecloths so they can’t pull hot
foods or liquids down on themselves.
Z Lock household cleaning products, knives, matches, and plastic bags
away from children. This will prevent poisonings, bleeding injuries,
bums, and suffocation.
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In Other Living Areas
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Install smoke detectors on each floor of your home, especially near
sleeping areas; change the batteries each year. This will prevent deaths
and injuries from fires.
Use safety gates to block stairways and safety plugs to cover electrical
outlets. This will prevent injuries from falls and electric shocks.
Keep all small objects, including tiny toys and balloons, away from
young children. This will prevent choking and possible death.
Resource: http://www.parenthub.com/parenting/safety/baby.htm
Baby and Child Safety Guide.
Alcohol, con’t from page 12
woman consumes, the more the
liver’s fat content increases. A fatty
liver can lead to alcoholic hepatitis.
In turn, inflammation of the liver
leaves scarring. The scarred liver
prevents elimination of impurities
in the blood. This causes cirrhosis
of the liver. Forty percent of all
patients with cirrhosis are women
between ages 15 and 34.
Alcohol affects a woman’s
hormonal balance. A woman
drinker is apt to drink heavier
during her menstrual (moon) cycle.
She becomes more intoxicated than
usual during this time. During the
premenstrual phase, studies have
shown the absorption rate is
significantly faster than in other
phases of the menstrual cycle.
Therefore, during premenstrual a
woman gets drunk faster. A woman
who takes birth control pills stays
drunk longer, even though she is not
drinking more than she usually
does. Alcohol may increase a
woman’s risk of breast cancer
by 50 percent. Scientists do not
know why.
Alcohol affects women
differently than men, causing
women to have a higher risk of
dying once health problems arise.
Women and men vary in their
amounts of body fat and water. The
difference of women having more
fat and lower amounts of water is
that alcohol is not fat-soluble.
Therefore, a woman and a man of
equal size, both drinking the same
amounts of alcohol, will have
different blood alcohol levels. The
equivalent doses are more
damaging to women. Women
develop health problems at a lower
level of alcohol consumption than
men do.
If you think you can drink
successfully and you are a woman,
think again. The physical evidence
proves that a woman’s health is
likely to deteriorate at a faster rate
than a man’s is. The woman’s body
is not made to process heavy
amounts of alcohol. Small amounts
of drinking eventually lead to
physical dependency, consequently
breaking down the organs in a
female’s body and causing the
possibility of death.
1. Ipi^na, Teresa, Ed. Red
Voices for American Indian Women
and Families Sacramento: Volume
III, No. 9
2. IpFna, Teresa, Ed. Red
Voices for American Indian Women
and Families Women s Alcoholism
Center, San Francisco
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