Scooters cause behind spike in child injuries involving toys

The number of toy-related injuries has increased nearly 60 percent in the past two decades - in large part due to the growing popularity of foot-powered scooters.

For this study, Columbus hospital's Center for Injury Research and Policy researchers analyzed emergency room visit reports from 1990 to 2011, which demonstrated more than 3.3 million children got imperative treatment for a toy-related accident. That deciphered into one emergency room visit every 3-minutes in 2011.

Injuries involving toys increased by 40% percent between 1990 and 2011, a new report from Clinical Pediatrics found, with about 3,278,073 kids sent to emergency rooms for toy-related injuries over the two decades, or about 149,000 cases per year.

Dr. Gary Smith, the study's lead author and director of the center said, "I've never seen anything like it in my profession as a pediatric emergency room physician."

Smith noted that the study only took into account emergency room data and not accidents that were treated in urgent care centers, physician's offices or at home. This means the number of toy-related injuries was probably vastly under reported, he said.

"For the next two years the rate of scooter injuries spiked, dropped slightly until about 2005 and have been on the rise ever since," Smith said, adding that skate board injuries have actually declined during the same time period.

However, many of the injuries can easily be prevented with proper safety gear and appropriate supervision, he said.

"Wear a helmet, wear a helmet, wear a helmet," Smith warned.

"It's up to toy companies and groups like public health officials to improve toy-safety standards, design and recall effectiveness," he said.

The report is the first nationally representative study in toy-related injuries over time, though the Consumer Product Safety Commission examines injuries annually. In the two most recent reports, scooters top the list of the most dangerous toys for kids.