Safety tip for parents of toddlers

Get these - still not a perfect solution but better than nothing

Something in the brains of toddlers makes them want to swallow random things. The little coin-sized batteries are deadly. For some reason they tend to come apart internally. Nickels or quarters you just have to watch poop for a week til you find the $. With the batteries the situations tend to be that it eats through the esophagus and create a fistula into the trachea.

Working for decades in pediatric ICUs you get to see a lot of things you don’t want to. Off the top of my head I can call to mind 3 horrific situations and two of those toddlers survived but only after a prolonged ICU experience and years of surgeries + repeat hospitalizations.

As a parent of 2 (who are now 9 and 7), button batteries became a hate for me. After learning the shiny little pellets are deadly, I became a bit "hyperaware" of them. I've seen them thrown away in terrible places too, once even on the ground at a park. So many toddler toys (and books that make noise, etc) use them too.
I'll vote for the next politician who bans the use of these in toys, I don't care which party you are!

Parent of three here - 16, 13, 10. Out of the danger zone for sure, but still hate those batteries.  Not only are they dangerous, they are a pain in the ass to find the correct battery.

I do like that most newer devices that use them require a screwdriver to change the batteries - at least it is some barrier to keep prying little hands from getting them out.

Years ago, my niece choked on one of those. Luckily, she was able to cough it back out with a little help for her mom. My son was the same age so I tossed anything that had a simple Velcro closure for the batteries and used Loctite on everything that had a screw cover. 
Kevin

whole grapes still #1 on the list

Little globes the same diameter as a child’s trachea are bad for sure

They can be ejected, even by the person who has inhaled it - I witnessed one myself, and one of my coworkers had firsthand experience

Irregular shapes are harder to dislodge, and the corrosive sh*t that leaks out of them does serious internal damage. For some reason all the cases I was privy to the battery leaked its contents before hitting the stomach

Take my word these situations ain’t pretty

Working emergency and icu can make a nervous mess out of a parent

Yup

I was a Navy Corpsman, worked trauma-urgent care , along with working sick call .also we were licensed EMTs so had duty on ambulances that served the duty station, including base housing .

Only time I ever had to dislodge a foreign object was a toddler nephew and my own kid .

I did a heimlich on a kid once that was choking on Easter candy. Was very thankful I knew what to do in that situation.

I did a heimlich on a kid once that was choking on Easter candy. Was very thankful I knew what to do in that situation.

 

good on you dude !