Accidents at Home

 Deutsche Version

Injury in the home accounts for approximately a third of all injuries. The majority of injuries of children under five and people over 75 years of age occur at home. In every dwelling, there are potential threats to individual safety such as stairs and windows, electricity and heating, bathtubs and stoves. Every building comes with a risk. However simple safety measures, such as preventing falls from stairs, can be implemented to create a safe home environment. As not every risk can be avoided completely, the opportunities of architecture and building design for making housing features as safe as possible have to be identified. For this, it is necessary to ascertain the major risks in order to develop a list of the most relevant housing hazards, and to determine the essential elements of existing best practice examples and propel forward its possibilities. Ultimately, the objective is to develop construction guidelines and regulation standards that entail requirements for homes to be constructed with safety as priority.

Further Information

Results of the nationwide german health interview and examination survey for children and adolescents (KiGGS) are published with the title “Injuries Among Children and Adolescents (1–17 years) and Implementation of Safety Measures”
Verletzungen bei Kindern und Jugendlichen und Umsetzung von persönlichen Schutzmaßnahmen

The WHO European Centre for Environment and Health reports of a WHO expert meeting in Bonn, 30 May 2005
Preventing Children Accidents and Improving Home Safety in the European Region

Update 06/2011