These seat belt covers could save your child’s life in an accident

No one likes to think about what could happen to their children in an emergency like a car accident. But one mother of five worried about her daughter with special needs getting the appropriate care if no one in the family could speak to first responders.

Natalie Bell’s daughter, Shae, is deaf and has a cochlear implant. As a result, EMTs and hospital workers need to take extra care when administering tests and treatments to Shae.

Bell came up with an idea for how to alert emergency workers and hospital staff about her daughter’s special needs in the event of a car accident: a seat belt cover identifying Shae’s condition and restrictions.

“To alert first responders in an unfortunate event where I cannot speak on her behalf — and just wanting to keep my daughter safe at all times — I personalized a set of seat belt covers which specify important medical details so that first respondents have vital information relating to my daughter,” Bell shared on her website Personalised by Nat. “Shae has a cochlear implant to assist in providing sound signals to her brain. Because of this implant, it is important she is not exposed to the magnetic field of an MRI which can do damage.”

It didn’t take long before this mom’s idea caught the attention of other mothers who wanted these for their own children. Parents reached out through social media to ask for seat belt covers for their children with autism, Asperger syndrome and other conditions to give them peace of mind in the car. Bell posted a photo of one she created for the parents of a child with autism on the Personalised by Nat Facebook page:

Even emergency workers have connected with Bell to express their appreciation for her ingenuity and how it has helped their efforts to care for all potential patients.

“I’m a firefighter/instructor at a fire college/academy in the UK,” commenter Colin Nulty posted on Facebook. “I have mentioned this to a lot of colleagues and the response has been great. They are brilliant and would help us out so much at incidents. Best of luck. This is about to go platinum for your business.”

Bell’s website shows a variety of seat belt cover options you can order and customize. She is based in Australia but ships her product around the world for $25 plus shipping costs. You can now also find them on Amazon for $15.99 each!