Could My Child Get Injured at a Daycare Center in Frisco, Texas?

Our Frisco daycare and child injury lawyers at The Button Law Firm are helping parents learn about negligent practices at local daycare centers that can lead to children getting seriously hurt.

Parents in Frisco look for safe daycare centers by researching websites like Care.com and Yelp with rankings based on reviews. In addition, local online community groups such as Moms of Frisco, Frisco Moms Society, and Frisco Moms Squad are great options to get feedback from others in the neighborhood about their experiences at specific daycare centers. While it may feel like you have all bases covered when it comes to child safety at a local facility, daycare injuries can happen at even the highest-ranked childcare centers. We’re here to explain the common causes of daycare injuries, the types of injuries that little ones can experience, and what to do if your child is hurt at a daycare center in Frisco.

What Causes Injuries at Daycare Centers in Frisco, Texas?

Plain and simple: When local daycare centers do not follow Texas daycare safety laws, also known as the minimum standards, children get hurt. In legal terminology, these preventable hazards and unsafe practices are referred to as negligence. 

When it comes to negligence, there are four main causes of daycare injuries at Frisco centers:  

• Poor Supervision: The whole point of childcare help is to ensure your child is closely watched while you are at work. However, some daycare centers in Frisco are understaffed and exceed state-mandated child-to-caregiver ratios. When this happens, caregivers are unable to keep a close visual and auditory check on each child, and therefore they are unable to properly supervise all the children in their care. This lack of supervision means they cannot easily spot potential hazards and quickly intervene before a child is injured. In addition, daycare directors should be regularly checking on all caregivers and classrooms. This way, they can ensure caregivers are following the minimum standards and they should respond quickly to address any red flags or unsafe practices.  

• Poor Communication: When you entrust your child’s well-being with a daycare center in Frisco, you may want to be updated on any progress or issues that arise. With new technology, some parents easily access updates on their child’s classroom activities and environment by watching a live feed. However, our experienced daycare injury lawyers have seen caregivers and local centers that keep information from parents about a child’s injury that happened at the center until several hours or days later. In some cases, negligent centers even try covering up an incident that occurred.

• Lack of Training: Texas’ minimum standards mandate that all caregivers have a minimum of 24 hours of annual training before caring for a child. This training should touch on safety practices, age-appropriate teaching and discipline methods, and ways to identify and respond to emergency situations. Unfortunately, the high demand for childcare help and the current caregiver shortage leads some daycare centers in Frisco to hire unqualified workers who have not completed any training and are not knowledgeable about the minimum standards. Thus, these caregivers do not have the skills to keep little ones out of harm's way and provide them with an enriching learning environment.
• Unsafe Facility: Surprisingly, the childcare center’s building itself can be the cause of quite a number of daycare injury incidents. Playground structures that are not child appropriate or have rusty or broken parts can lead to head injuries and lacerations, to name a few types of wounds children can experience during recess. If a curious child finds a hole in a broken fence, they may wiggle through it and wander off of the daycare premises completely. In the classroom, poorly installed or unsecured furniture can fall, resulting in broken bones, head injuries, or finger crush injuries. (Did you know there are certain requirements that address furnishings allowed in a daycare classroom?) And, if the daycare center in Frisco has an infant classroom, watch this video to learn more about the laws to keep babies safe.

What Types of Injuries Could My Child Suffer While in Frisco Daycare?

Some of the most common types of injuries our experienced daycare injury lawyers have seen at centers in Frisco include:

• Abuse: This can happen when caregivers choose to use improper discipline methods on your child. They may even physically abuse children to keep them “in line.” These aggressive behaviors are red flags for any caregiver, and they are certainly prohibited at a licensed daycare center.
• Allergic reactions: There are many steps a daycare center in Frisco can take to prevent allergic reactions, but equally important is the caregivers’ ability to recognize and take action if your child does suffer an allergic reaction.
• Burns: Burns happen more often than you may think at daycare centers in Frisco. There are a few ways your child may be injured, but bottle warmer burns are the most common. Additionally, caregivers who use cleaning products or other chemicals that are harmful to children can expose them to dangerous chemical burns. Electric shock can be prevented by using outlet covers and keeping cords out of children’s reach, but some daycare centers may fail to take these simple steps.
• Falls: Little ones encounter a lot of adult-sized objects, even at daycare centers. Changing tables and high chairs, which are often at adult height, can be quite a big drop to the flood if the child is unsupervised and falls off. Exciting play structures built for 5-year-olds can be too daunting for a toddler. So if your child’s daycare isn’t choosing age- and size-appropriate playground equipment, children could be at risk of sustaining injuries from falls, which can result in cuts and bruises or even head injuries like traumatic brain injuries.
• Finger injuries: Getting fingers stuck in doors and other objects where children can get their fingers stuck is the main cause of finger injuries, which can include broken fingers or severed fingers. Unsupervised children may hurt each other by biting or stepping on each other’s fingers as well.
• Neglect due to improper supervision: Depending on the age of the child, their classroom has a child-to-caregiver ratio that helps caregivers keep an eye on every child. If the ratio is not followed, or if caregivers are too busy paying attention to something other than the kids, your little one could get into a dangerous situation.
• Overheating in a hot daycare van: More than you might expect, caregivers lose track of their children in daycare vans. When temperatures peak in the summer, this can make for a dangerous combination.
• Sexual abuse: Sexual abuse is most common if daycare centers are failing to run background checks on potentially harmful adults. However, sexual abuse can be at the hands of another child as well.

Parents in Frisco can learn more about common daycare injuries and red flags that could indicate a local daycare center is not complying with state laws by checking out our extensive library of articles here. 

How Can I Help My Child After They Were Injured at a Daycare in Frisco, Texas?

Between helping your child, processing how a local daycare center failed your child and family, and balancing other responsibilities, the stress you experience can be overwhelming. To help, our Frisco daycare injury lawyers recommend following these steps after your child is harmed at a local center:

1. Get Medical Help: Taking your child to a hospital like Medical City Frisco Hospital or Cook Children's Hospital (West Frisco) ensures that they can be checked out for any injuries that are below the surface. It also means that the doctor can provide your family with a medical report, which is helpful for documentation.
2. Gather Documentation: Regardless of whether you decide to hold the daycare center accountable, collecting documentation is helpful. Photos of injuries, talking to other parents about what happened, and collecting surveillance footage if it’s available can provide a fuller story of what happened. Incident reports should be created by the daycare center to make you aware of what happened, according to the center. This information is helpful for lawyers as they collect evidence but can also help when reporting an incident to the state.
3. Report the Incident to the State of Texas: When you report a daycare center incident to the state, you are allowing the state to conduct an independent review and help warn other parents about what happened at your child’s daycare center. For immediate help, you can call 1-800-252-5400, or you can visit https://www.txabusehotline.org/ to report the incident online. The state keeps a database of injuries so that parents like you can stay informed on the safest daycare centers for your children.
4. Contact the daycare and child injury lawyers at The Button Law Firm: When you trust a daycare center to keep your little one safe and they fail to do so, you may be able to sue. The daycare center’s responsibility was to keep your child out of danger; if they took actions or made decisions that failed to do that, they can be held accountable. Learning your options can help you decide if you want to seek justice for your child’s injury within the two-year statute of limitations that exists.

Be sure to download our free guide detailing the five steps to follow after a child’s daycare injury if you are not quite ready to take legal action, or speak with our daycare and child injury lawyers for a free case evaluation.

Was Your Child Injured at a Daycare Center in Frisco? Contact The Button Law Firm.

If your child was physically or emotionally harmed or injured because of negligent practices at a daycare center in Frisco, Texas, our team of experienced and compassionate daycare and child injury lawyers at The Button Law Firm can help. We’re dedicated to advocating for you and your family. We are ready to listen and fight for your family to get justice and move forward. Our lawyers at The Button Law Firm are recognized on the prestigious Texas Super Lawyers list, and we can help guide you after a traumatizing incident involving your child. We work on contingency, meaning we don’t charge you or collect any upfront fees to get started on your case. Get a free case evaluation by calling us at 214-699-4409, emailing us at [email protected], or filling out a contact form.