Workplace first aid kits... a bit more important than a box of tissues

After a little emergency at work today I thought it was a good reminder for everyone to check their first aid kits.

 

Well today one of the truck drivers from the neighbouring business complex, whilst unloading his trailer had a bit of a mishap and dropped one of the removable vertical stays that holds up the trailer roof onto his foot. The metal stay weighs something in the vicinity of 5kg and has a sharp edge at the bottom. Fortunately he was wearing steel cap boots... but unfortunately the stay hit the top of his foot near the ankle where there is no protection other then the leather of the boot.

 

Suffice to say after a little screaming on his part, a big chunk of flesh missing and quite possibly a broken bone or three, some blood loss, me applying a wound dressing and a quick trip by the Ambulance to Emergency it made me think about going over the work first aid kit. Well the first aid kit was really quite lacking so I’ve spent a little bit time restocking it.

 

Whilst I believe it’s important to know the contents of your first aid kit in reality most people won’t remember exactly the size or type of dressing they should be using in an emergency. Hence to keep it simple I think it’s the case of grabbing some saline to wash any dirt out of the wound and ANY dressing which is big enough to cover the wound. Of course you could debate whether to use a sticky or non-sticky dressing or whether to use one of the 101-brands of dressings all of which are designed to be used for slightly different applications but the important thing to do is to stop the bleeding. If the patient can withstand the increased pain applying a little pressure and of course a bandage is the best thing to do whilst waiting for the Ambulance. Remember you are stabilising the patient until the professionals arrive (which will be only a few minutes in any metropolitan area) so any wound care doesn’t have to be pretty, only functional. That’s why I like Wound Dressings (or otherwise called Battle Dressings) as it is a combined dressing with a sewn-in bandage in the one package so you just grab the biggest one you have, wrap the wound, tie it off and you’re done.

 

Most importantly remember to glove up before touching blood to stop the potential transfer of any nasties.

 

Well that was certainly a good reminder for me to keep a stocked kit at work that consists of something a bit more substantial then bandaids and paracetamol. I hope it’s a help to anyone else out there as well.

 

Of course doing a Senior First Aid course is the best way to learn how to do it and what to do in an emergency.

 

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