Testing the Hypothesis, Part 1 - 7A
Opportunity: Hundreds of children have
suffered from heatstroke by being left in a locked car on a hot day. Sometimes
leading to death. Heatstroke is the leading cause of passenger vehicle
non-crash related fatalities for children 14 and younger. This opportunity
stemmed from a TV interview I saw years ago on Oprah.
·
The who: Parents and children
·
The what: Children suffer from heatstroke
in cars on hot days and this can sometimes lead to death
·
The why: Parents often forget their children in cars
Hypothesis:
o Testing the who: Parents and children mainly have the need but also pet owners.
o Testing the what: Not only can children and pets suffer from heatstroke on hot days but
also from frostbite or hypothermia on cold days depending on where the family
live.
o Testing the why: The main why is because parents and people in general are busy and
they are imperfect so they forget things. If they aren’t sticking to their
usual routine, it may slip their mind. No one (hopefully) leaves behind a child
or pet on purpose.
What I learned from the
interviews: After
the interviews, no one experienced a child suffering from heatstroke. But
during my third interview, I was surprised to hear that a female that was
travelling with her pet left her dog inside the car on a hot day with the
window cracked open for 10 minutes. After she returned to the car her dog was
panting and foaming of the mouth. She realized it was abnormal behavior so she
took the dog to the vet and they told her that he suffered from heat
exhaustion. Close to a heatstroke. It was a very scary realization that if left
any longer, even with the windows down, her dog could’ve passed away. One case
of heatstroke is one too many. From the interview I saw on TV, a mother recalls
the story of forgetting her firstborn in the car. Her loss was not only
physical but mental and emotional. Legal action was taken against the mother
for negligence and forced her to relive that horrific day over and over again
as she faced the law. It’s extremely unfortunate and I think there is a way to
prevent this from happening.
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ReplyDeleteHi Amanda,
ReplyDeleteMany people are continuing to try and find a solution to how to avoid leaving children in hot cars. It's sad to think that many children's end up suffering from heatstroke or even die because of the negligence of an adult. It's interesting if you ever get to read the statistics; in the U.S. every year 37 children die after being left in a hot car. And it's even more alarming to see most of those deaths are from the state of Florida, considering how warm our climate is here. I've seen several people try to come up with solutions by creating an app that would alert a driver that they've left a child but it seems no ones found a sure fire answer just yet. After reading your's I realize that you picked an opportunity that affects a larger group of people, rather than mine which only really affects UF students.