To you, your dresser is a place to put your clothes. To a four year- old, that dresser is Mt. Everest, just waiting to be climbed. Unfortunately, many parents realize that fact only after it is too late, and a child is injured or killed by an accident involving common household furniture.

According to a seventeen- year study conducted by researchers at the Center for Injury Research and Policy at Nationwide Children's Hospital in Columbus, Ohio, 14,000 Americans, on average, under age 17, visit the emergency room annually due to injuries from household furniture. About 300 of these accidents result in death, annually. And these statistics only include injured children who actually sought medical treatment, so there is a good chance that the actual numbers are higher than the study shows.

The study looked at injuries that involved 12 furniture types, including dressers, desks, and television sets.

Most of the injuries that were a part of the study involved children aged 6 and younger. The most common piece of furniture falling over on a child was a television set. The most serious injuries, mostly to the neck and head, involved children 1 to 3 years of age. The older the child, the more likely that the injury was to the lower body.

The primary cause of these injuries is furniture, electronics like TV sets, and appliances, that are manufactured in such a way that they are not balanced, and can easily tip over onto a child. In fact, about a quarter of the injuries in the study came from furniture tipping over onto a child who was climbing on it.

There are simply no official safety standards in place in this country that pertain to ordinary, everyday furniture. There are a set of voluntary standards published by ASTM, recently revised, to try to prevent furniture from tipping over. But according to the Consumers Union, it is easy to find "furniture on the market that doesn't comply with the standard. More importantly we found furniture from major manufacturers that is still dangerously tippy notwithstanding its compliance with the standard."

The new standard, just released in May 2009, asks for tip- restraint units and warning labels. While only voluntary, these standards show that furniture manufacturers are very aware of the potential danger in furniture that can tip over and injure children.

If your child has been injured by a piece of household furniture or a TV tipping over, you may be entitled to compensation from the manufacturer. Our law firm is highly experienced in this area of law and would be glad to assist you. Please contact us.