Safety Tips While Travelling with your Child

Travelling on a family holiday, weekend with friends or a sight-seeing tour can be real fun, relaxing and rejuvenating; however travelling with kids can be like taking care of a herd of wild goats, with a child’s need being more than sticking to a CD full of pop music and making toilet stops.

Here are some safety tips while travelling with children:

While travelling by car check that the car seats are correctly fitted with the straps in good place; ensure that the air bag is disabled if the child car seat is fitted in the front passenger seat. Ensure safe, secure and comfortable travel for toddlers by using good secure belt travel pillows that has shoulder straps to hold the baby secure on the shoulder and also provide a snug cushion to support the head.

Again travelling by car would be helped by fitting baby or child on the board sign to the rear window to alert the emergency services while searching for babies in case of accidents. You could enjoy peace of mind without putting other road users at risk by having a child rear mirror to help keep an eye on the little ones at back.

Be prepared for the worst and travel with emergency phone numbers like vehicle recovery; also keep an emergency pack for long tailbacks or breakdowns and other essentials like blankets, torch, water, child specific and age appropriate foods and additional clothing for each child. Ensure your baby is dry and comfortable while outdoors with an infant seat cover.

Be prepared for the climate as children dressed comfortably for the weather and terrain will be happier in a new environment; dress toddlers in ski-suits with gloves in snow and do not leave them barefoot on a beach where sea urchins lurk. Even if your child is walking it would be useful to take a pram or a buggy that could help them rest during day trips and help to carry bags. If your destination does not have paved paths it would be worth investing on an all-terrain version.

Take your time travelling, as toddlers love to explore and do not want to experience the pressures of travel; you are also likely to keep your cool if you factor gawping, stalling, and toilet stops in your time frame. Also remember that just as children get tired and weary, so will you; stop regularly for breaks and don’t drive.  It also helps to book ahead if you are camping or staying in hotels as it would be difficult to hit the road again with tired and hungry children.

Don’t forget the medicine and the first aid kit with vitals as regular medicines, antiseptic wipes, plasters, sting treatment, thermometer, antihistamines, sachets of painkilling syrup and anti-malarial. You would need the advice of specialist’s advice on the appropriate anti-malarial medication if you're travelling to a country in which malaria is endemic. Anti-malarial tablets are more common than syrup; also ensure you have ample supply of insect repellent and clothes to cover everyone up in the evenings and impregnate bed-nets with insecticide.

Invest in a child locator; a small unit strapped to a belt or shoe and you keep the transmitter to set off an alarm and follow the sound to find them. You could brand them while travelling through busy, crowded airports or transport hubs; write your mobile number on your child’s arm to contact you if they get lost.

Keep bugs at bay with antibacterial wipes and hand sanitizer and remember to keep baby wipes. Antibacterial wipes and hand sanitizers come in handy to wipe cutlery in restaurants where you’re unsure of hygiene, or a squirt of hand sanitizer when there’s no washing facilities; you can not only zap a few germs, but can also prevent toddlers from catching common bugs. Besides cleaning babies at each diaper change, baby wipes are very useful for washing hands, cleaning toilet seats, and wiping down restaurant tables. Though bottles of hand cleansers are very useful in some countries, check the travel regulations well in advance.

While travelling by car during summer with rising temperatures, ensure you keep the little ones shaded and vehicles cool by fitting roller blinds and sun shades on the car windows. Ensure that the window is left slightly open for circulation of cool air should you wish to get out of the car for a short while.

Minimize dangerous driver distractions by maintaining peace and harmony in the backseat; give children their similar travel kits of toys, coloring items and healthy, non-messy snacks to avoid squabbles. During long journeys on road, train and air keep a ready supply of handheld puzzles, tiny coloring books, stickers, word searches and even tiny packs of plasticine; some best family games for delay are punch-buggy, padiddle and alphabet game. Thanks to toddler-friendly apps, the most compact form of entertainment is a device loaded with apps and games.

If your children have special needs, it can be helpful talking to parents whose children have similar conditions to get useful travel tips. Getting an identity bracelet with details of your child's medical condition, treatment and their doctor's name is useful in case of emergencies. The same rule applies to children that have serious allergies; let them travel with a card that specifies in the language of your destination what they are allergic to and how serious the condition is.

Avoid sweets and pack up a mixture of savory snacks like cheese cubes, breadsticks, fruit and bagels to avoid arriving in a strange city with children in the middle of a sugar rush.

Ensure that you take a plastic sheet that can be put anywhere to play if you are travelling with a baby that crawls. It would also help in case of infants to carry a steam sterilizer to sterilize things regularly; for sterilizing small things it would help to use sterilizing tablets in water-tight screw-top containers. You would need fresh bottles each time for babies on bottles; save space by filling spare bottles with water and adding add milk powder and boiling water when you need them.

Children do not drink enough water and could be prone to dehydration; it is best for breastfeeding mothers to drink a lot of water or to encourage the babies to drink water. Mothers need to check that the urine of their children is not darker, cloudy and strong smelling. If the tap water isn't safe to drink, you could buy bottled water; however bottled water with the lowest mineral content should be used for formula feeds. Keeping a bottle of drinking water by the sink is a helpful reminder.

Dehydration or changes in diet during travel can cause constipation; besides water to drink babies tummies should be massaged with light oil. You can also gently rub a button of Vaseline over their anus and encourage older children to drink water with a few teaspoons of a light vegetable oil, in addition to applying Vaseline as an abdominal massage.

These are some of the essential safety tips while travelling with your child.