Fireplace Dangers Lurk in the Glass
Jennifer Gore's son Tommy is one of the lucky ones.
That's her view of the hand burn the then 11 1/2 month old suffered while playing at a friend's house. Tommy's is one of many incidents of serious fireplace burns to hands and arms that doctors at Children's National Medical Center have seen this winter. And Tommy, unlike many of the other children, did not need a skin graft.
Jasmine severely burned both her hands by touching an artificial gas fireplace's glass on Christmas. In the background is her father, Damian Key. (Family photo)
Children's hospital typically sees about 60 burns per week at the burn clinic, says Ananth Murthy, a pediatric plastic surgeon and associate burn director at Children’s hospital. Of those, usually 2 or 3 will have to be admitted. This winter, those numbers have jumped significantly, Murthy reports. "When we see 2 or 3 of these a month and they all need surgery, that is a major jump," he says. Between Jan. 1 and Feb. 24, the hospital has had nine cases of serious fireplace-related burns.
Murthy says these burns are caused by gas fireplaces with glass fronts. The one that Tommy touched was a Majestic gas fireplace that vented out the back to the side of the house.
"As any parent does, when you first walk in, you scan the room," Gore said. "The fire was turned on low. I saw the fire, and thought, oh, great, I don’t have to worry about the fire, it’s behind the glass." She noted that the friend's house was the most child-proofed house of anyone she knows. And neither the home's owner, mom of three Tracy McLaughlin, nor Gore, realized how hot the glass could get. "We thought the glass was more like an oven door," Gore said.
In fact, the glass front of a gas artificial fireplace can heat up to 500 degrees Fahrenheit 10 to 15 minutes after turning the fireplace on, Murthy says. And it stays hot long after the fireplace is turned off. "Even after one half-hour, it's still close to 150 to 200 degrees Fahrenheit," he says.
At 150 degrees, a person would have to be exposed to hot water at 5 to 6 seconds to suffer a 3rd-degree burn. At higher temperatures, less than 1 second of exposure can cause this most serious burn, the type that Children's has been seeing this winter.
That's the type of burn that Kesha Robinson's daughter Jasmine suffered around Christmastime. Jasmine was a toddling 11 month old that day when she was visiting her grandmother in Southern Maryland along with her father, Damian Key. Key had gone into the kitchen to get something when he heard Jasmine screaming. "She was at that stage when they fall forward, their reflex is to hold on," Robinson said.
From there, it was a frenetic race to get to the hospital, where doctors diagnosed 3rd-degree burns on both of Jasmine's hands. Nearly 5 weeks after a skin graft to her left hand -- doctors decided the right one didn't need that -- Jasmine was back to picking up items and feeding herself, skills she needed to relearn, Robinson said. Her right hand had skin back on it and looked like it was headed for a full recovery. The family was still unsure of how much use Jasmine would have in her left hand.
"Initially the pain was so bad. She would moan, she couldn’t do anything with her hands. It was traumatic for her. She holds her hands now as if to protect them. When she falls she checks her hands. She has an awareness of her hands. Right now her left hand, she holds it to her side or up in the air."
That trauma extends to the families as well, who have watched their children suffer serious burns and who help change bandages and give the children's hands sometimes painful physical therapy to keep mobility. Gore describes the trauma as worse for her than for Tommy. And Robinson said, "It was more emotional trauma for her grandmother and father. This was definitely a lesson for adults, parents, grandparents to make sure their home is child-proofed."
To child-proof a fireplace, put a screen or gate in front of it and be vigilant about watching children who are near a fireplace. Don't let children touch any parts of a fireplace, says a Consumer Product Safety Commission spokeswoman, Patty Davis. Also, make sure that children can't inadvertently turn on an artificial or gas fireplace in your absence, Murthy advises.
By Stacey Garfinkle |
February 25, 2009; 7:00 AM ET
| Category:
Safety
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Comments
Posted by: skeptic421 | February 25, 2009 8:28 AM
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skeptic, no, there's nothing special about gas fireplaces -- well, except that they typically come outfitted with a glass front, instead of the open fire approach of a woodburning fireplace. I think the point was that the parents expected the glass to be insulated, like an oven door.
I feel horrible for these kids. But at the same time, it does seem pretty basic that fire is hot. I would put that in the category of "I'd better check it" instead of "I'll assume it's safe."
Posted by: laura33 | February 25, 2009 9:06 AM
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A gas fireplace is designed to help heat a room. It is just as dangerous as an open heater and parents need to be aware of that.
Posted by: mdembski1 | February 25, 2009 9:07 AM
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I'm really sorry to hear about the children being burned. That's terrible.
That being said - come on folks, use your brains.
"We thought the glass was more like an oven door,"
Why would you think that?
The purpose of an oven is to heat food, INSIDE the oven. Ovens are carefully designed and built to PREVENT heat loss, because that makes them inefficient and very poor at actually cooking food. Having glass that heats up would let heat escape from the oven. So a whole bunch of engineers spend a whole bunch of time and money designing glass that does NOT heat up.
The purpose of a fireplace - gas or wood - is to deliver radiant heat into the house. In other words, you WANT heat to escape from the fireplace through that place where the glass is. Having glass that would not heat up would defeat the entire purpose of the fireplace, because it wouldn't heat the part of the house in front of it. So glass heating up is a good thing in fireplace design.
Come on, folks, think about this for a minute or two.
Posted by: ArmyBrat1 | February 25, 2009 9:10 AM
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Kids have been doing this for a long time - a firend of mine fell into the glass door of a freestanding wood fireplace at age three, 32 years ago. Fortunately she didn't need grafts and she has full use of both hands. But this is why fireplace manufacturers always recommend a screen in front of the fireplace and warn against leaving children unsupervised around them.
Furthering AB's point, fireplaces also burn a lot hotter than ovens. So, not only are they designed to let heat out rather than keep it in, they're generating more heat to start with.
Posted by: northgs | February 25, 2009 9:35 AM
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I'm with AB on this one. If it were not for the sad consequences for the kids involved, I would be ready to nominate this one for the "Really? Seriously?" sketch on SNL's Weekend Update.
Posted by: CharmCityMom | February 25, 2009 11:13 AM
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Breaking news: Fire is HOT! Details at 11....
Posted by: Catwhowalked | February 25, 2009 11:17 AM
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Sad to read about these injuries. HOWEVER, doesn't it ever occur to parents to keep an eye on their kids, especially toddlers? Toddlers and fireplaces? Dangerous combination. Just like toddlers and swimming pools, toddlers and roads, toddlers and big angry dogs, toddlers and stairs, toddlers and open windows, toddlers and cigarette lighters. If you can't watch them around dangerous things maybe you shouldn't have them. Vigilence over your kid is better than paying medical or funeral bills.
This reminds me of the story of the mother suing the makers of her kid's nightgown that went up in flames while the kid was playing with a cigarette lighter. DUH! Why did that kid have a cigarette lighter in the first place?
Posted by: Baltimore11 | February 25, 2009 11:55 AM
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Um..............
Posted by: jezebel3 | February 25, 2009 12:11 PM
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Seriously, I am always amazed when I hear these stories -- parents really have to step up and be smarter than the average bear....
FIRE IS HOT, therefore, anything around it will also BE HOT!!!
I think parents forget that young children have to be "taught" about HOT, they don't just "know" about HOT.
This is one of those things that I love to say to my son around our wood burning stove, "Son, because I love you so much you cannot be within 10 feet of the wood burning stove or fireplace until you're 30" and because we're just too busy today to take you to the hospital. And then.....I make sure that there is 10 feet between my child and HOT.
Rocket Science? Nope, just common sense....
Posted by: tecatesdream | February 25, 2009 1:59 PM
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I think the manufacturer should be sued.
Posted by: WhackyWeasel | February 25, 2009 2:24 PM
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I feel terrible for the children involved, but I can't understand why you would have a fire going in the fireplace with a small child around. Or if you did, why you would leave said child alone in the room with it, especially a baby who can't possbly be expected to know better.
Posted by: floof | February 25, 2009 2:25 PM
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When my son was almost 1, we went to a friend's home during an ice storm because our power had gone out. She had a glass-front fireplace, and I did not realize that it had been on (hers was the kind that goes on and off with a switch). Anyhow, we had just come in the family room and my son crawled over to the fireplace and attempted to pull up on it and started screaming! We ran over to see what was the matter and could see his hands had been burnt. My friend felt HORRIBLE that she had not realized the fireplace would be so hot as to burn hands, and my husband and I felt bad because we had all been there, and didn't see any danger (as I said the fire was out when we got there). Fortunately, my son just needed bandages and a special cream on his hands for 2 weeks and a few weeks later, you could barely see anything and he has no scars or other signs of it. But at the time, it was very scary!
Posted by: nfowife | February 25, 2009 3:02 PM
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Common Sense 101- Since the Stone age- Close fire is bad for the little ones.
Posted by: jezebel3 | February 25, 2009 3:07 PM
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The comments to this entry are closed.
Is there something unique about gas fireplaces? Or is this true of other fireplaces? Something about the heat going up the chimney, rather than out the back? Excuse my ignorance, I am not well-versed in fireplaces (or fire for that matter). . .