There is interesting information on two fronts. The National AAP recently convened Chapter and committee representatives in the area of Injury Prevention for a three day conference in Elk Grove Village. Secondly, the UH Manoa Center on the Family has some interesting and useful resources available to pediatricians.

I am continuing to serve as the Hawaii AAP representative to the Keiki Injury Prevention Coalition (KIPC). At the April 1st meeting a number of topics were discussed including legislation affecting child safety. KIPC members were urged to support booster seat and graduated driver licensure bills currently still alive.
One topic of interest to the general pediatrician is the extensive list of free resources available from the UH Manoa Center on the Family. The Center recently undertook a project to update and collate a list of parenting education programs available across our State. You are encouraged to visit the Center on the Family Resource page to view the list of available publications. They are free for downloading and a limited number of printed copies are available on request. The URL for the resource page is:

http://www.uhfamily.hawaii.edu/publications/publications.asp, and there is a link to the Center on the Family home page via our “Links” page.

Pop quiz: Which of the following three injury prevention measures is of proven benefit in reducing injury?

A) Drivers education classes
B) Four sided pool fencing
C) the D.A.R.E program (to discourage substance abuse).

If you answered B) pool fencing, you were correct. This was one of many things I learned at the recent meeting held March 18-20 at AAP headquarters in Elk Grove Village outside Chicago. More than 50 AAP Chapter leaders, Academy staff and representatives from government agencies such as the Consumer Product Safety Commission and the Health Resources and Services Administration were in attendance.

The meeting was funded by a grant from HRSA and was the first of its kind at AAP. Its purpose was to gather together for the first time AAP committee and section members involved with injury prevention as well as Chapter representatives such as myself. We learned about some of the pertinent policy statements dealing with various injury areas including drowning, motor vehicle occupant injury, teenage drivers, violence prevention and traumatic brain injury. The overall purpose was to motivate and assist Chapter Injury Prevention chairs to work with the Section and Committee on Injury, Violence and Poison Prevention and with each other.

One of the tasks I committed to was to constitute an Injury, Violence and Poison Prevention committee within our Chapter. I welcome any interested members to contact me. I promise regular but infrequent meetings and communication tailored to the needs of those interested.

Please e-mail to ksaruwatari@straub.net or call 483-6084.