One family had a traumatic experience after their son fell off a bunk bed.
A contestant on “The Bachelorette” was placed in intensive care after falling off a bunk bed, drawing new attention to a problem that affects tens of thousands of Americans.
David Ravitz sustained the traumatic injury on season 14 of the ABC reality dating competition. He was black and blue after suffering multiple facial injuries, including a broken nose.
More than 36,000 people are treated for bunk-bed related injuries each year, and some are left fighting for their lives.
In 2015, Georgia Tech student Clark Jacobs, 20, fell seven feet to the ground, landing on his head after rolling off his campus bunk bed while asleep.
His mother, Mariellen Jacobs remembers the agony as Clark was in a coma for 10 weeks.
"We had to get emergency brain surgery," she told Inside Edition. "The surgeon came to tell us that Clark was in bad shape. He said if we don't operate he's going to die and if we do operate, he still might not make it. I’m facing the fact that my son might be gone and the thought of that happening was just horrible."
He eventually woke up, but he had to re-learn everything, including how to walk, talk and eat.
"Oh my gosh — I can't even describe — the amount of hard work I had to do was obscene," he told Inside Edition.
Years after the incident, Clark's now back in school at Georgia Tech University but still struggles with memory, coordination and fatigue.
"It’s mentally unbelievably exhausting,” he said.
This family says these accidents, like what the viewers saw on “The Bachelorette,” are completely preventable, which is why they launched a nonprofit called Rail Against the Danger, fighting to make all bunk beds safe with the installation of a simple bed rail using a 2x4 and bolts.
Since 2008, retail beds are required to have a safety bed rail because of the Consumer Product Safety Commissions standard. No such standard exists on institutional beds, which cover college dorms, summer camps and vacation homes.
The Jacobs family and Rail Against the Danger (RAD) are now pursuing legislation to require safety rails on bunk and loft beds in all institutional settings.
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