Scott Webb (Host): There's never a bad time to talk about water safety for our little ones and even teens, but as we head into summer, it's a great time to have my guest on to help parents to keep their kids safe around water. I'm joined today by Dr. Nadareh Varemini. She's a Pediatrician with Stanford Medicine Children's Health.

 This is Health Talks from Stanford Medicine Children's Health. I'm Scott Webb.

Doctor, it's so nice to have you here today. We're going to talk about water safety, and I was saying to you never a bad time probably, but especially heading into the summer months. So let's just start there. Why is water safety so important?

Nadareh Varemini, MD, FFAP: Yes. Thank you for having me. Water safety is very important because drowning is the leading cause of injury related death among children between the ages of one and four. And it is the third leading cause of unintentional injury related death among children under 19 years of age. But the good news is many of these deaths are preventable.

 It is so tragic for families to lose a child. That's why it's so important to prevent this type of injury that's 80% preventable in a lot of ages of children.

Host: Right. Yeah. I think that that's the key thing there, right, to underscore is it is preventable. So let's talk more then about how do we do that? How do we prevent these things? And it makes me wonder, you know, is there different maybe water safety approaches depending on the locations, like beach versus pool? Maybe you could take us through that.

Nadareh Varemini, MD, FFAP: Definitely. You are right there are different type of safety for waters at home like pool or, hot tubs or even kiddie pools and the beaches and lakes and rivers. But the main thing is an adult supervision anywhere near the water. We need to have a very close adult supervision. A vigilant, adult should watch children, and even teenagers who are in the water and they definitely should be an arms range so they can right away help them. Let's divide it by two categories. Let's talk about water safety at home and in the pool. For families with pools, limiting access to the water can reduce the risk of drowning by 80%. If we have four foot tall fencing around the pools or bodies of water at home, it's very helpful and 80%, it's pretty impressive. A fence can prevent kids that are under age four from reaching the water. The fence should have a self closing or self latching gate. What is interesting is that little kids especially under age one, they can drown in one inch of water like in the tubs, in buckets, kiddie pools, or even toilets. That's why we should always always empty the tubs and buckets, and kiddie pools. We should always keep the toilet doors closed when it's not in use, to prevent those type of drowning for younger kids. For teenagers we need to be cautious of influence, drug, alcohol influence, can add to the risk and dangers of drowning in the swimming pool.

One thing, that's very important I always tell teenagers always have a buddy even if you're the best swimmer, even if you're a lifeguard, have a buddy that can ask for help. If you need help they can reach somebody and they can help you. Another thing with summer and kids playing in the pool around the pool is avoiding rough playing and running around the pool. The other one is to make sure there is a lifeguard available and present to monitor children and teenagers. Something that is helpful is to have brightly colored swimsuits that's visible under the water like neon colors like lime green, hot pink ,orange can help to locate them if they are submerged in the water. One thing that teenagers like to do is holding each other's head under the water to see who canstay there longer. That's super dangerous. Definitely we need to stop them from doing that. Adult and teenagers need to learn CPR to help somebody who is in need.

Next one is open water safety. For instance rivers and beaches. We need to consider ocean rip currents. We need to educate them on how to recognize it, how to escape it, and how to save a friend if needed, but definitely without putting themselves in danger.

For the river, river currents can be dangerous. Other things that can happen is like vegetation under the water or animals. We need to always check the weather report for storms or rough water before going to the beach or lakes or rivers and stay where the lifeguards posted, whenever possible.

Avoid swimming in murky water where you cannot see the depth. And of course, wearing Coast Guard approved personal flotation device is very important when boating or when you are in bodies of water.

Host: Yeah, a lot of great suggestions there. I love the bright colored suits, you know, uh, they're fun and, also practical to be able to see kids when they're in the water. Of course. And you touched on a little bit there, maybe some different considerations based on age. Maybe we can just dive in, no pun intended, of course, a little bit deeper to that. Maybe especially with the younger ones.

Nadareh Varemini, MD, FFAP: So the younger ones who don't know how to swim, we need to literally be an arm reach and a hundred percent focus on them because they're fast. They can be out of your reach in a second. When we are watching kids, we need to avoid checking our phones, checking texts, sending texts. We need to be a hundred percent focused on children. When they're older, definitely swimming lessons as soon as possible. Of course even though they know how to swim, we need to observe them and watch them. When they're teenagers, it's again observation is important, watching them is important. As I said, even if they're best swimmer, they should never swim alone.

Host: Good stuff today. Just want to have you finish up and talk about how pediatricians can help. Obviously you're helping today doing this podcast with us, but how in general can you help parents, especially if they have more questions?

Nadareh Varemini, MD, FFAP: Definitely, I think as Primary Care Physicians, Pediatricians, Physician Assistants, Nurse Practitioners we do a lot of checkups so we should always at every checkup talk about risks of bodies of water, the pools, or rivers and oceans. We need to make it a part of our checkup or every visit especially around this time to remind them how important it is to be water safe and remind parents to make sure they start swim classes, as soon as possible for their children.

Host: Yeah. Swim classes for sure. And I think the key takeaway from me, from you today was the stop looking at your phone, stop playing on your phone, especially with little ones. Really pay attention. Be literally arm's length away or even closer. Right. Uh, be touching them. That's okay. So, I really appreciate your time and your expertise today.

Thank you so much.

Nadareh Varemini, MD, FFAP: Of course my pleasure. Have a great summer.

Host: And for more information, go to stanfordchildrens.org. And we hope you found this podcast to be helpful and informative. If you did, please share it on your social channels and be sure to check out the full podcast library for additional topics of interest. This is Health Talks from Stanford Medicine Children's Health. I'm Scott Webb. Stay well, and we'll talk again next time.