What Happened to Your Child at Daycare?

If you're picking up your child from daycare, and you see that they have an injury that they didn't have when you dropped them off, like a broken bone, or serious bruise, you asked the daycare what happened.

But they don't seem to be telling you everything.

Now, if you find yourself in this situation, here are the five questions that you need to ask.

Five Important Questions to Ask After a Catastrophic Daycare Injury

  1. Question one, "could I get a copy of the incident report?" If a child is involved in an incident that put them at risk of serious injury or death, or required medical attention, the daycare must complete an incident report. Their failure to do so is a violation of the state's rules. Additionally, make sure the entire incident report is completed, including the date and time of the incident, the teachers involved, where it happened, and what they did about it.
     
  2. The second question you need to ask is "who is in charge of monitoring my child?" get specific information about the caregivers that were supposed to watch your child? This information is important, as you may be able to see if they were properly trained and background checked prior to working with the children at this daycare.
     
  3. Third, you need to ask, "can I see a video of the incident?" Although it's not legally required, the daycares should have cameras monitoring the children. Now, it's important that you preserve the video immediately. That way the daycare doesn't have time to delete it, and claim the incident never happened. If the daycare allows you watch the video, you can preserve it in two ways. First, take a video of the video with your phone or request that a copy be sent to you. If they aren't willing to show you the video or share a copy of the video. You need to seek a daycare injury attorney right away.
     
  4. The fourth question you need to ask at the daycare is, "when did the incident happen?" Knowing this can help with the investigation and also help with determining the cause of the injury. Pay close attention if the daycare has inconsistencies in their story, and make sure to take notes on everything. Some common examples are when kids are left outside or in hot daycare vans. When infants and toddlers have severe burns and emergency personnel is not called or when a child goes missing at a daycare, and the daycare hasn't alerted the authorities. Plus, if the injury is serious and requires immediate medical attention, the daycares lack of action is a direct violation of the state's standards.
     
  5. The fifth and final question you need to ask the daycare is, "have they reported this incident to the state?" And more importantly, are they going to all incidents involving a child at risk of a serious injury or death are required to be self-reported by the daycare, but not all do, which means you should call and report the incident to the state so they start their investigation right away.

What To Do If Your Child Was Seriously Injured at Daycare

The hard truth is daycares, their directors, their employees will often try to refrain from telling the whole truth as it can potentially ruin their daycare's reputation. If you feel your child's daycare was hiding information, reach out to us. Our firm has experience handling claims against daycares who will abuse or neglect children. Be sure to contact us to get help today.