Miller Children’s Hospital Long Beach Partners With Safe Kids LA — A Community Coalition Dedicated to Injury Prevention

Miller Children’s Hospital Long Beach partners with Safe Kids LA to bring more safety and injury prevention programs and services to children and adolescents throughout the Long Beach community and surrounding region. A number of organizations collaborate in Safe Kids LA, bringing together experts in safety and children, including, a number of hospitals with Trauma Centers, the Automobile Association of America (AAA), Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD), Department of Insurance and Los Angeles County Department of Public Health and other small non-profits who advocate for childhood safety.

Joining the Safe Kids LA coalition allows for an extended community partnership throughout LA County and helped Miller Children’s start its own Childhood Safety Coalition. Coalition members reach out to local communities with injury prevention messages, safety devices and hands-on training. The coalition performs passenger seat checks and participates in community health fairs.

These programs reach children and families directly through:

• Educating adults and children with coalition materials and resources
• Creating safe environments
• Conducting research
• Advocating for effective laws
• Demonstrate injury prevention activities

Safe Kids LA is a regional branch of Safe Kids Worldwide — a global network of organizations whose mission is to prevent accidental childhood injury, a leading killer of children 14 and under. More than 450 Safe Kids coalitions in 16 countries bring together health and safety experts, educators, corporations, foundations, governments and volunteers.

As a part of the children’s hospital mission, Miller Children’s strongly advocates for children in the prevention of unnecessary injury and illness. Also, in collaboration with Long Beach Memorial, Miller Children’s has access to a Level II Trauma Center, further supporting the need to be a part of the Sake Kids LA coalition. Global trauma-related costs exceed over $500 billion annually and trauma-related injuries and accidents are the number one killer for children over the age of 1 in America. 

The national accidental injury death rate among children ages 14 and under has declined more than 40 percent since the inception of Safe Kids.