Prevalence and pattern of child restraints use in cars, Mashad, Iran

Introduction Although some law reinforcements has recently decreased the high rate of death attributable to road traffic crashes in Iran, there are still no laws necessitating the use of child safety seats (CSS) in Iran. The purpose of the study was to determine the prevalence and pattern of CSS use in Mashad, Iran. Methods Mashad is the second highly populated city in the North-East of Iran with high injury death and morbidity. We performed a survey on 590 parents of kindergarten children who owned an automobile and were willing to participate in the study. The demographic characteristics, the history of road traffic crashes, history of receiving advice on CSS use and if they used CSS in the car were recorded in the questionnaires. Results About 25.4% of interviewed parents owned a CSS, among them 87 had bought, 19 had borrowed and 44 had received it as a gift. Of these 150 families with CSS, 113 (75.3%) did not use the CSS anymore as it was suitable for the infants. Thus, at the time of the study 37 families used CSS in their cars (6.3% of total). The main reason for nonuse was reported as not feeling the need(n=197), followed by high price (n=103). Discussion This study shows that the use of CSS in cars is rather scarce and should be promoted in Iran. There is also evidence of knowledge gap regarding effectiveness of CSS which needs to be addressed by health authorities.