Medical Control of Emergency Medical Service Systems

All newborns discharged from hospitals should be transported home in appropriate infant car safety seats that are designed to safely transport healthy newborns, premature infants, or infants with special needs.

Assuring that newborns are properly restrained when riding for the first time sets the stage for continued compliance with a measure that can save their lives or prevent serious injury. Correctly used infant/child safety seats are 71 percent effective in preventing car crash fatalities, and 67 percent effective in preventing injury requiring hospitalization.¹ With 100 percent correct use, about 53,000 injuries and 500 deaths could be prevented each year in the United States among children from birth to four years of age.²