Side-impact car crashes can be more severe than others...and they're a growing concern when it comes to child safety seats.

The government is scheduled to study the issue, and come up with guidelines to help U.S. manufacturers. Several European car seat makers already have special products in the stores.

Kim Washburn buckles baby Kaleb up tight every time they go for a ride.

"Our rule is he's always in a car seat," she says.

The child restraint seat she uses is great for collisions from the front, but doesn't offer extra protection for side impact car crashes. That's when her child may be most vulnerable.

Kristy Arbogast is a bio-engineer and clinical researcher. She says, "Although frontal impacts are the most common direction of impact, side impacts have the highest fatality rate and the highest injury rate."

When it comes to side impact crashes, the injuries to your little one can be very big.

"Primarily, the injuries that children sustain in side impact crashes are to the head, to the face and the thorax, to the chest," Arbogast warns.

So, Kim is trying out a new kind of car seat…designed by a European company. The biggest difference is the sidewings.

"They're designed with special foam and special structure such that the impact to that structure manages the energy of the crash," Arbogast says.

Engineers say the logic with this is sound, but there's a reason American manufacturers aren't producing these seats yet.

"There is not an accepted crash test dummy, nor test procedure for side impacts and child restraints," Arbogast explains.

So in the U.S., there's currently no way to document just how effective these special seats may be. A test procedure and dummy are supposed to be submitted by July, but other issues will also need to be worked out.

"If we design a child restraint that a child is uncomfortable in, such that they can't see out of or makes them uncomfortable in, and as a result less people use child restraints, in the end we haven't done anything good," Arbogast asserts.

Meantime, Kim and Kaleb would rather not wait, and plan to continue using the European model.

"His safety is number one. Knowing the car seat is safe and is comfortable for him, that is forefront in my mind," Kim says.

Currently, the European car seats are available in the U.S. for $150 to $300, through manufacturers such as Peg Perego and Britax.

We contacted the various American manufacturers. None have plans to make the seats until after the procedures are set in July, and the new guidelines are in place.