Car seats for disabled children

jennet1

My son is 5 and in standard car seat, but he keeps throwing himself backwards and banging his head on the back of the seat. can you get a large car seat with a 5 point harness? and if so would we be likely to get one through our ot or would be have to buy it ourselves?

mrscb

We got one from OT...it was very heavy and sturdy and on a swivel base so no awkward moves to get DS into car.:D

littleredcorvette

Yes, you can get larger car seats with a 5-point harness, but they're expensive:

http://www.olivers-baby-care.co.uk/Traveller-Plus-Special-Needs-Car-Seat/58pol841p.asp

http://www.jcmseating.co.uk/pages/hscs.html

http://www.jcmseating.co.uk/pages/carrot.html

http://www.delichon.co.uk/subpage.php?NID=3

A few people on my favourite Special Needs website have had car seats paid for by Social Services, but it seems to depend on where they live.
Others have successfully applied for funding from a charity, but the majority have had to pay for them themselves.

marvin

If local council won't pay for it (check out if they do carers equipment grants as pioneered in Birmingham (everyone kept telling us its not legal when we started doing it) and copied all over the place if the OT dept says no).

If not then the family fund may be able to help or the princess royal trust or some local grant giving carity may help.

jennet1

Thank you for all your replies , i will phone our ot on monday ans see what she has to say

longhotbath

Hi - also look at the crelling harness, which can be used with a standard booster and back stle car seat. It may be a more cost affective option.

Our social services ot service will not provide car seats, as they only do equipment in the home, but Im definately going to look into carers equipment grants....

We bought our own delichon recarro - fantastic car seat, but no family holiday that year:(

kingfisherblue

We needed a special car seat a few years ago. First we borrowed one from Wigan council. Our own council doesn't have a loan scheme where you can try our different sets and Wigan was the nearest one to us that does - they don't usually lend to people out of the area, but as it was an expensive and specialist seat, they allowed us, with a deposit of about £50. This was about six years ago. The seat was a Britax, but I can't remember the model details. When we confirmed that it was suitable, we were able to get one from the Family Fund. The seat cost about £210, without a cover. The cover was an extra £45. These prices are excluding VAT, which we didn't have to pay because it was designed specifically for use by a disabled person.

devizes18193

http://www.incarsafetycentre.co.uk/

covlass

My daughter had one when she was younger our OT got it for us via a charity !