State ranks No. 7 in child drownings

Research conducted by the Arkansas Infant and Child Death Review Program at Arkansas Children's Hospital ranks Arkansas seventh in the nation for drownings among children younger than 17. The state's rate of drowning is 60 percent higher than the national average.

The incidence of drowning at pools and on open bodies of water is higher as children grow old enough to be more independent. The children who die from submersion in recreational settings tend to be older, ages 10 to 17. Most younger drowning victims don't die in a swimming pool.

More than 5 percent of child drownings in the state since 2010 involved children ages 1 to 4 who drowned in a bathtub or a bucket.

Dr. Elizabeth Storm, an emergency medicine specialist at Children's, says these buckets tend to be "in the yard. It's just an amount of water. In the rural parts of the state you would think about troughs for animals to drink out of, buckets that you have out for horses or cows to drink out of."

With large heads and tiny bodies, infants and toddlers are top heavy. They go head-first into things and can't get out. Drownings can occur in an inch or less of water.

-- Celia Storey

ActiveStyle on 08/24/2015

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