Rear seat occupants must wear seat belt, advise doctors

Bengaluru: Seat belts are mandatory but many believe that it is only for those who are sitting in the front. However, proving this notion wrong, an eight-year-old boy, Amrit (name changed) and his mother had suffered huge casualties for ignoring this basic safety advisory.

A recent road accident involving a young family brought into sharp focus the need for wearing seat belt by those occuplying rear seats. Even though it had a happy ending, the accident could have easily wiped out the family's happiness in a moment. All this was because the rear-seat occupants did not 'buckle up seat belt'.

Narrating the case history to The Hans India, Dr Vinu Raj (Consultant-Orthopedics and Spine surgeon at Prakriya Hospital) said that the family was on an extended road trip to Goa followed by attending a friend's wedding and had finished a trip through Maharashtra.

"While coming back to Bengaluru the father of the eight-year-old boy was at the wheel and the mother and child were in the rear seat. It was early hours of the morning and since the child was sleepy, the mother was keeping the child company in the back seat. Neither the child nor the mother was wearing seat-belt though it was their wont to scrupulously follow traffic rules all the time," he said.

The vehicle collided with another one on a highway. "Even though they were within the speed limits, the angle of impact was such that the car toppled over, rolling a couple of times. Due to the impact the mother and child were thrown around in the rear seat of the car. While the father was wearing the seatbelt and the airbags deployed, he was able to walk out of the car without even a scratch. However, the mother was thrown around in the car and suffered a fracture of the spine. The fracture was such that, even a little bit more force would have left her paralysed from the waist down," Dr Vinu Raj added.

The mother was shifted to hospital. The child had a minor fracture of the neck vertebra, and the doctors say that due to sheer luck he managed to escape from spinal cord injury and paralysis.

The mother was treated with fixation of the spine. The child was treated in a neck collar to help the bone to heal.

"This could have very easily turned into a tragedy for the family with loss of life or loss of independence. All of this from not wearing the seat belt while sitting in the rear seat of a car," Raj said.