Playground Safety: Using Research to Guide Community Policy

Each year over 200,000 children in the United States require emergency medical treatment for playground-related injuries, costing an estimated $1.2 billion. Thus, the issue of playground safety is a topic of concern for many health care professionals. However, without a reasonable understanding of the scope and magnitude of the problem, any attempts to develop an injury prevention program will be limited. Therefore, this article reviews the data-based playground research so that suggestions can be made concerning the development of a comprehensive playground injury prevention program.