All kinds of accidents can occur inside and outside your home. From knee scrapes and paper cuts to injuries more serious and requiring medical attention, you and other family members need to be ever-alert to avoid getting hurt.

Leading the list of home injuries are tripping and falling – often there are no serious consequences but, when there are, they can require a trip to the emergency room. In fact, tripping and falling in the bathroom accounts for 25% of all emergency room visits.

So, if your home environment isn’t as safe as you’d like it to be, observe the following tips to help keep your family safe from harm.

1. Keep a flashlight and candles handy. The “things that go bump in the night” are usually people. And the usual cause is walking without the assistance of light. That’s why you’re well advised to keep flashlights, batteries, and candles conveniently located throughout your house, especially in case of a power outage. We also can install motion sensitive night lights that turn on automatically when someone gets up at night…they later turn themselves off.

2. Remove clutter. Tripping over random objects left carelessly on the floor is one of the easiest ways to fall and hurt yourself. So, before retiring for the evening, get family members to assist you in picking up all loose items left on the floor, including shoes and clothing.

3. Add friction to steps, decks, and ramps. From temporary solutions like adhesive grip strips to more permanent options like screw-on aluminum plates, floor guards help eliminate slippery conditions on a variety of otherwise tricky surfaces.

4. Install safety gates on stairs. Nearly 100,000 children fall down a flight of stairs each year, later to be rushed to the emergency room for treatment. Now, help keep your kids extra safe by installing hardware-mounted safety gates at the tops and bottoms of the stairs. Choose gates that are certified by the Juvenile Products Manufacturers’ Association, don’t have trip bars, and are easy for you – but not your child – to open.

5. Outdoor lighting. Footpath and house-mounted motion-sensitive security lights are just two ways to light up the night when leaving or returning home. Outdoor lighting also adds beauty to your home’s exterior.

Here at Excel Electric, we are home lighting experts. From lighting design to full installation plus recommendation on the right kind of lighting for each application, we can help add a whole new dimension of home security for you and those you care most about. Contact us today for a free in-home consultation and proposal.