Family Safety

Childproofing Your Doors — A Practical Ottawa Parent's Guide

Ask any parent of a toddler and they'll tell you: the doors in a house are where a surprising number of small injuries happen. A finger caught in a hinge gap, a door slammed shut in a winter draft, a curious two-year-old who has figured out the patio handle. None of it is dramatic, but all of it is avoidable — and most of the fixes take an afternoon and a few dollars in hardware.

We see a lot of Ottawa homes, and the doors that worry us for young kids are almost always the same ones. Here's a room-by-room walk through what actually matters, in roughly the order we'd tackle it ourselves.

Start with the pinch points

Where Fingers Get Caught

Every door has two places that catch little fingers, and people only ever think about one of them. The obvious one is the latch edge — the side that closes against the frame. A soft U-shaped foam guard slides over the top of the door and stops it latching all the way, which keeps it from pinching fingers and from locking behind a child.

The one people forget is the hinge side. The gap that opens up between the door and the frame on the hinge edge closes like a pair of scissors, and it's right at a toddler's height. A hinge-side pinch guard — a flexible plastic shield that covers that gap along the height of the door — is cheap, quick to fit, and prevents the worst of the crush injuries we hear about. If your hinges are loose, squeaking, or letting the door sag, fix that first; a door that doesn't hang true is harder to guard. Our hinge and hardware repair page covers what's involved.

Stop the slamming

Doors That Bang Shut

Ottawa homes get drafty in winter, and a door left ajar can swing shut hard when the furnace kicks in or someone opens an exterior door across the house. A slamming door is loud, it wears out the frame, and it's exactly the moment a finger gets caught. A door closer or a soft-close mechanism solves it by controlling the last few inches so the door settles instead of banging. We adjust and install these all the time — see door closer repair and installation. If you'd rather start with the free version, our guide on how to stop a door from slamming walks through the simple causes first.

Knobs, levers and getting locked in

Handles & Locks

Round knobs and lever handles need different solutions. A knob cover defeats small hands because they can't get the grip to turn it. Levers are easier for a child to work — they just hang on them — so they need a lever lock or a flip guard instead. Either way, loose or sticking hardware makes guards fit badly, so it's worth sorting the handle out first; that's straightforward lock and handle repair work.

The other classic is the toddler who locks themselves in the bathroom. Most privacy locks have an emergency release on the outside — a small hole you can pop with a thin tool. Check that yours actually works before you need it at 7 a.m. on a weekday. If it doesn't, that's a five-minute fix, and far better to know now.

Patio and sliding doors

The Big Glass Ones

Sliding patio doors are a favourite with determined toddlers because the handle is low and the door is light. Add a secondary lock mounted high on the frame, out of reach, so the door simply can't be opened and walked through. Put a few decals at kid's-eye-level on the glass so nobody runs into it. And keep the rollers and track healthy — a door that drags is harder for you to control and easier for a child to leave half-open. If yours is sticking, our patio door repair and sliding door repair pages explain the usual culprits.