The Family Resource Center at Yavapai Regional Medical Center will continue its partnership with the Governor’s Office of Highway Safety to offer a free car seat safety program to families in Yavapai County.

For over 30 years, YRMC’s Family Resource Center has served families in the Quad City area, working to keep children safe and empowering parents with the knowledge, tools, and resources to build strong parent-child relationships and to give children the best start to life possible! 

Incorporating the latest research in early child development, the Family Resource Center’s nationally accredited Healthy Families program supports parents and children via free home visits from highly trained early childhood specialists. This program promotes healthy pregnancies, bonding and attachment, and ways to encourage healthy brain development. Healthy brain development creates the foundation for emotional regulation and a child’s perception, ability, and skill to respond to everything in life, as they enter adulthood.  This includes how they cope with stress and challenges, and what kind of relationships (of all types) they pursue.  YRMC’s Healthy Families program also provides developmental and other screenings and connections to community resources, individualized for each family.

A renewed grant from the Governor’s Office of Highway Safety in the amount of $13,923 will support the Family Resource Center team as they support families in an additional way - offering car seat safety checks, distributing seats free of charge when needed, and providing supporting education to help keep children safe inside their family’s vehicles. During the 2019 fiscal year, over 96% of the seats checked via this program arrived in an unsafe configuration, greatly increasing the child’s risk of injury or death in the event of a car accident.

Caregivers need a vehicle with working seat belts and will receive a one-time 30-45 minute session that includes child safety seat education, a safety check guide, and hands on installation in their vehicle.  Caregivers who already have seats are invited to take advantage of this program to complete a safety check and assure all safety aspects are considered (for example, car seats expire, typically 6 years after the date of manufacture, at which point the seat can no longer adequately protect a child).  These sessions are scheduled weekly and provided by nationally certified Child Passenger Safety technicians.

Keeping your child safe is one of the most important jobs of caregivers. YRMC’s Family Resource Center and the Governor’s Office of Highway Safety have made it easier for many of our families in the Quad City area to do just that. For more information or to schedule an appointment, please call the Family Resource Center at (928) 771-5651.