Safe Luxury

Are there any safe restraints for kids with autism?

One of my customers has a child with severe autism. They are a wonderful and supportive family with more than one special needs child. As of late the physical abuse sustained by the parents and siblings of said child is becoming difficult for parents to handle. Mom asked about info on safety restraints for home and vehicle so as to assist in keeping other family members safe during the more difficult outbursts and to SAFELY be able to transport pt. and siblings to appointments. I have not been able to locate ANY information on such products and in fact most info i have reviewed seems to condemn such devices. Any advice from folks w/ similar situations that i might pass on? Thank You In Advance ...

Public Comments

1. hmmmm.........is this child seeing a specialist in the Autism field? Sounds like he needs medication. I have a 15 year old son with Autism and he does not need restraints, but then he is seeing therapists and also on medication to control the outbursts, he takes risperdol and lamictal in very low doeses daily. When he was a toddler i used a wrist to wrist velcro bungie type thing so he could walk with me in stores and not have to hold my hand. Good luck to you and your friend, having a child with Autism is very difficult but also very rewarding.
2. the family should check with the childs psychologist. They may also find some interesting products on www.superduper.com or www.abilitations.com. I believe that abilitations has a large stretchy band that you can tie around a child to hold them into a chair. I am seriously thinking of one for my 13 year old son...he has PDD-NOS and violent rages. This would be better than sitting on him during his rages
3. You really walk a fine line when using restraint even with special needs children. If anyone gets wind of it you can soon find yourself in court or worse yet jail. I suggest talking with a therapist and get the child on some medications that can help get him thru the rages. I have seen a 14 year old boy who had autism take a set of double dutch doors that were extremely heavy off the hinges when he was going thru a rage. It was scary. Not even a grown man that was strong could do that. It is amazing the hurt and damage a child can cause at any age.