Multi-pronged Approach Needed to Save Children from Vehicular Heatstroke

September 12, 2025

An average of 37 children die each year from Pediatric Vehicular Heatstroke (PVH) in the U.S., according to a recent study from the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP). Though many of those deaths may have been preventable, there is no simple solution.

Since 1998, more than 1,000 children have died due to PVH, as noted in the study in the American Journal of Public Health. Researchers indicated that multiple approaches have been implemented to combat this ongoing problem, including awareness campaigns, mobile apps, after-market technologies, and in-direct detection systems.

"This tragic situation can happen to anyone, and we feel that multiple technologies working in tandem are the best way to reduce the number of vehicular heatstroke deaths that occur,” said co-lead study author Jalaj Maheshwari, MSE, a research staff scientist with Center for Injury Research and Prevention (CIRP) at CHOP.

Here are a few key takeaways:

• Promising tech:  After-market devices show some promise. These include indirect detection technologies (Bluetooth device connection, GPS-based reminders), direct detection technologies (pressure sensors and radio frequency sensors that detect breathing and heartbeat), alerting technology (warning chimes/noises, primary contacts notified), and intervention features (air conditioning on, doors unlocking).
• Mixed Results:  The researchers identified 10 scenarios across 354 recent instances of vehicular heatstroke and found that the technologies' effectiveness varied drastically. For example, carbon dioxide, optical, pressure, ultrasonic, and radar/radio-frequency detection technologies would have been successful in detecting the children in 80–90 percent of cases, whereas child seat chest restraint sensors would have only protected children in one of the scenarios.
• Other solutions:  Notifying a secondary contact was the only technology that would have effectively brought intervention to every child across scenarios, assuming that the cases of overheating were due to children being left behind intentionally or unintentionally by caregivers, with a call to 911 or emergency medical services being the best-case scenario.
  • Alerting by sounding the vehicle's horn may also have been effective but only if the vehicle was in proximity to people who could intervene, which was not always the case. Leaving the air conditioning on in the car would have prevented 80 percent of cases identified.
• Near misses:  The study only focused on vehicular heatstroke deaths, the most serious cases, but did not investigate the potentially hundreds or thousands of "near miss" incidents that may put children at risk.

Quotable:  "We have a responsibility to children around the country for making sure these completely preventable deaths never happen," said senior study author Kristy Arbogast, PhD, scientific director of CIRP at CHOP. "In addition to technology, we need to continue to make sure caregivers are educated about the real danger posed to children by overheating vehicles, and how quickly that danger can build.”

Read the report online.