A toaster for $2! A set of encyclopedias for $10! Like many of you, I am a sucker for a good bargain. The bargains we find at local garage sales and resale shops can be too good to believe . . . and sometimes they are. Without knowing it, many people purchase or sell dangerous and recalled items at their resale shops or garage sales.

A recent survey conducted by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission showed nearly 70 percent of all resale shops visited had at least one dangerous or recalled product for sale. The next time you go bargain hunting, be sure to watch for recalled items or items that do not meet current safety standards. I always remind my friends to be especially aware of these potential dangers:

Cribs. Older cribs can entrap, strangle or even suffocate children. Cribs with more than 2 3/8” between crib slats or cut-outs on the headboard or footboard may suffocate or strangle a child. Cribs with missing or broken parts or corner posts higher than 1/16” also present a risk of death.
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School will be starting soon. It’s time to help get your kids on a healthy back to school sleep schedule.

Kids need more sleep than adults. Children ages 6 to 12 years old need 10 to 11 hours of sleep at night. Teenagers need at least nine hours of sleep.

It’s important to get enough sleep because chronic sleep deprivation has been linked to poor school performance, behavioral, developmental and mood problems, weight gain and obesity. Drowsy teens who get behind the wheel of a car can cause a deadly accident.

Here’s a sleep checklist to start working on now:

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Hi I’m Gus, and I’d like to take you on a tour of Safeville. Safeville is a town dedicated to poison prevention. My human friends at Children’s Health Education Center and Wisconsin Poison Center teamed up to create fun and interactive games for children ages 3-7 to teach them how to stay safe if they come across a poison.

There is a lot to learn in Safeville. Before I flew around Safeville, I didn’t know that more than 1/2 of poison exposures occur in children 5 years or younger. I knew my bird friends and I get upset stomachs after eating anything but berries, but I didn’t know poisons make so many children sick and that this could be prevented.

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Pediatric Nurse Practitioner Jeanne Connor and her family, of Muskego, participated in the grand opening ribbon tying ceremony.

We are thrilled to announce that our New Berlin clinic opened and is seeing its first patients today. Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin-New Berlin Clinics is located just north of I-43 at the intersection of Moorland and Beloit Roads. It is a beautiful new three-story, 75,000 square foot space. This is Children’s first venture into opening an outpatient center that will provide a place for many of the same pediatric specialists who practice at Children’s Hospital to see patients closer to families who live in New Berlin and surrounding communities.

We’ve had the opportunity to speak with so many of our families who come to Children’s Hospital for specialty care who now can have that same care closer to home in a much more convenient setting. Our goal is to make life easier for parents.

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