The Emergency That Never Comes

This is Steven Petrick posting.

Most of us will pass through our lives never having to face an emergency. For us it is simply a matter of interest to read that someone had just finished a course on administering the Heimlich Maneuver, or cardio-pulmonary respiration, when they were faced with having to actually apply their lessons to save a life. It is, however, almost a standard that in a crisis situation where there are mass casualties, the majority of people may want, may even try, to help, but simply do not know how.

For most of us, this emergency will never come.

We would all be a lot better off if everyone, as part of their education (not just those who get into the scouts, whether boy or girl) were taught some pretty basic first aid: simple things like treating for shock, or recognizing heat exhaustion and
heat prostration or how to bandage relatively simple wounds.

Much of this is taught to soldiers in basic training in a very short period of time; would it be that hard to teach the entire civilian populace as they pass through high school?

You do not think you will face an emergency when you walk out the door, and yet taking a little time in your life to put together little emergency kits would let you be prepared: a small first aid kit in the trunk of your car, a few extra items carried on your person.

Few of us, in our modern lives, realize how important it can be to be able to access fire. Fewer and fewer of us smoke, and so do not carry lighters, but also have no intrinsic knowledge of how to ignite a flame without one. Would it really hurt you to carry a small disposable lighter so that if you needed a flame, one would be handy?

You do not know what will happen to you, beyond question, on any given day. Most of you already have a very powerful tool for emergencies in the cell phone, but what can you do to keep the victim you have found alive until the ambulance can get there?

Sometimes getting the victim out of burning wreck may entail having to cut through his or her seatbelt; having a knife available to you can be a life saver in such a case. Using that knife to cut material for a tourniquet would not be out of the question.

Knowing how to apply a tourniquet and that you need to loosen it now and again to allow some blood flow to the restricted area is also important. Knowing you should record the time you applied the tourniquet so you can tell the medic when he gets there (if your cell phone was able to summon one) is also important.

Think about the things you can have with you, the things you can keep in your car, the things you should have around the house.

Learn first aid, do not let it be something you are trying to figure out for the first time when the emergency is upon you.

The Emergency May Never Come, but there is no reason for it to take you unprepared when it does.