How To Baby-Proof Your House From Electrical Accidents?

Use these tips to baby-proof your house from electrical accidents. Start preparing your house as your little one starts crawling.

Nothing can make parents happier than their babies being able to move on their own. However, this happiness brings along some real dangers and challenges.

Being a parent, you will never want your baby to be caught in any big or small electrical accidents. Since it can’t be possible to keep an eye on your baby 24/7, you need to take a few steps in advance to ensure your baby’s safety.  However, this does not mean that you can lean back and take a nap while your baby is on the march of your home afterward. You need to always be cautious of your child’s actions and activities.

Babies are innocent. They don’t know what’s right and what’s wrong. They even don’t know what can be harmful to them and what can be benign. Being able to move for the first time, they like to explore everything that comes their way. They don’t mind chewing the wires of beautiful Christmas lighting, neither do they hesitate to bite the electrical cords, nor are they afraid of poking metal objects such as forks or knives into unprotected electrical appliances.

While all these can be utterly dangerous for your baby, we recommend baby-proofing your house from electrical accidents before your baby starts crawling or walking.

Here in this blog, we have compiled a few tips that you can take today to childproof your home against potentially dangerous situations involving electrical injuries. So, let’s dive in:

How To Babyproof Your House From Electrical Accidents?

• Opt for Shutter Styled Sockets

To baby-proof your home, the best option is to upgrade your power points to a safety shutter-style socket from brands like PDL and Legrand feature. This means that the active terminal is closed off by a plastic shutter to prevent children from putting things like paper clips in and getting a zap. The shutter opens when a plug top is inserted; the earth pin on a plug top is slightly longer which moves the shutter.

• Upgrade to Residual Current Device (RCD)

RCD (Residual Current Device) protection can be installed on the switchboard to prevent fatal electric shock. It switches power off to the circuit within 300 milliseconds when it senses a fault to earth (Someone getting electrocuted is a fault to earth). It is a regulation to install RCD protection on all new wiring and it is straightforward to retrofit RCD protection to older wiring by reconfiguring or upgrading the switchboard.

• Get Safety Electric Socket Plug Covers or Covers

If you are on a budget, you can purchase plastic socket inserts from your local hardware store. These plastic covers can be difficult to remove for babies but can be easily removed by parents. These are good interim measures but can be annoying to plug in and out one by one.

• Maintain all electrical appliances

Most of the time electrical injuries happen due to faulty or ailing electrical appliances. Hence, you must be cautious of the damaged appliance in your home and get it fixed by a professional residential electrician immediately. Other than this, ensure the cords of all appliances and chargers are in good condition. If you see any sort of wear and tear or the cords are frayed, then get rid of them. Moreover, give a comprehensive check on all the wall outlets to make sure there are no cracks or signs of breakage in them.

Other Factors To Ensure The Safety Of Your Baby

• See Your Home From Your Child’s Perspective

You have always seen your home from a height of 150cm to 180cm. on average, but your baby will see it from a height of 30cm to 60cm. It might be useful to crawl rather than walk to see the world of what your baby will see.  In this way, you will be able to discover the potential hazards, you might have otherwise missed.

• Electrical Train Your Baby

You might have heard of toilet training your baby, but have you heard of electrical training your baby? These are the electrical safety lessons that you need to teach your baby to keep him/her away from electrical hazards. Although you can’t expect a toddler to learn everything by heart, you will need to firmly tell him or her “no” when gauging the dangerous situation. Once, he/she does the right thing, appease him/her with a reward.

• Teach General Electric Safety Measure

To grown-up children of 4-10 years of age, you can directly make them familiar with various electrical safety measures like:

• Not to use wet hands to turn on and off electrical appliances
• Stay afar from fallen wires, broken wires, and more.
• Don’t touch the appliance that has come into contact with the water

What You Should Do When Your Baby Receives Electric Shock?

As a parent, your first instinct might be to remove your child from the electric shock but you will put yourself at risk by touching your child. You need to understand that this is not the time to panic, but to take action. Once you realize that your baby has received an electric shock, you need to:

• Disconnect the power supply before you touch your child
• Minimise moving your child, as a severe electric shock may cause a fractured spine
• Once the current is off, check your child’s pulse, breathing, and response. If there is no breathing or no heartbeat, begin CPR while someone else gets medical help.
• Call 111 for an ambulance or immediately take your child to the pediatrician because shock may cause internal damage that can’t be detected without a medical examination.
• Mouth burns on chewing the electric cords are often deeper than you may realize, and your child may require surgery after the initial healing.

Also Read: Basic Things To Consider When Hiring A Residential Electrician In Auckland NZ

FINAL WORDS

The above are a few tips that you can consider to babyproof your home from electric hazards.

Childhood is the most beautiful phase of everyone’s life. Let your child enjoy his/her childhood to the fullest while ensuring his/her safety from electric hazards by implementing the above-given safety measures across your home.

If you have any doubts or queries on how you can baby-proof your house from electric dangers, and how much do electrical services cost? then get assistance from the experts at Strike Electricals. We are a highly experienced and skilled electrical repair company in Auckland conducting all sorts of electric repairs at cost-effective prices.

Looking for an electrician in Auckland? Contact us now!