First Aid/CPR/AED

“Thnaks, I'll need it!”

“I am first aid and cpr certified, for girl scouts. I am also going to school for nursing. At the bookstore, the line was so long and we all were bundled for artic weather. All of a sudden a girl behind me keeled over into a display of pringles. A man rushed over and said "It's okay, I'm an emt." Then a zillion nursing students also wanted to help. It was a melee until the bookstore manager told everyone to go away and she picked the girl up and took her to a couch to put her feet up. She wasn't sweating and was just a little pale so we all figured she wasn't anaphalactic. Of course when I told my husband, he said she was probably taking drugs. I guess he went to a rough college.”

“Wild med also holds WFA courses. There is a schedule of classes on the site too.

Treebeard if you ever want to bounce program ideas and such around just email me or start a thread on it and let's rap.”

“1st Responder, but it's about to expire. Need to do something about that.”

“Ok and thanks, HPM.”

“Treebeard - definitely look into the scouts thing. My Civil Air Patrol Squadron sponsored my instructor course(s) so that I could teach the cadets for their medic badges. The wilderness FA stuff will be applied to their SAR training points (and rank).

Ski - I lived on campus in Conway (NH) for my course. It was AWESOME there!
:o)”

“I saw a quick blurb didn't catch it all.A Golden Retriever went with a Spanish Team to Mt. ? in
Agentina? 21,000ft.
A trained rescue dog,he was part of an altitude experiment.
Holds the dog record for highest
Altitude.”

“Puppy was wearing a red vest with
gold RESCUE and what looked like
pockets. Wuz only a 5 second news
bite....bastiges!”

“i looked at the solo wilderness over and over, but I can't find anything here in SC. I guess I need to check again. (blind a$$)”

“okay, next time I click on teh small little pictures before I post to TT about not finding something...

yeah, I found it. Thanks :)”

“Whoinhell is gonna ruck an aed?
Group hike? Hey it's your turn to
carry the pet rock! The new ones
you can't test or even open. Never
know if you treated it ruff until
it's time to use?
I saw an ad for the aed at home
version. What if your single?
Do you plug it in to the wall socket and apply the pads while you sleep?

(Devils Advocate)”

“Carry 9v batteries.
Hot wire and Defib pads.
heh,heh,heh.”

“Amy please help I've fallen and I can't get it up.”

“pete...if I helped you up, I fear you may never recover.

>;p”

“sirpete - just take your altitude medicine - it will get you up”

“I did classes for CPR and First aid in Wilderness classes and at my job.


8)”

“is he talking about his hair? Is it flat?”

“:)”

“For anyone who might be interested, The Tennessee Sierra Club Chapter is sponsoring a Wilderness First Aid course by SOLO the weekend of April 24-25 at Fall Creek Falls State Park in Tennessee. The cost is $125/person and covers course materials and lunch and snacks both days of training.

I took this course last year and found it to be excellent. I am also a registered nurse.

Anyone who is interested can contact me at Adelicia1@aol.com. A TT person named Searcher took the course last year also and had very positive comments regarding the course.”

“I was just re-certified in ARC First Aid/Adult CRP/AED Today! I will probably teach a class as early as next week. I haven't taught in over 2 years and look forward to getting back into it.”

“I just learned of a conference on wilderness medicine at the Big Sky Resort in Montana July28-Aug 1st. "The goal of this conference is to teach both practical and theoretical skills to health professional, search and rescue personnel, and interested lay people. At the conclusion of this conference, participants will be able to identify, diagnose and treat medical emergencies and problems commonly encountered in wilderness environments" Comes with a hefty fee...$325 for laypersons and higher for medical professionals but looks pretty interesting. Covers everything from snake bites, hypo&hyperthermia, lightning injuries, fractures, giardia, mountain search and rescue, wilderness toxicology, etc, etc. If anyone is interested you can e-mail me for more details.”

“that's pretty cool, Ivy. I heard about this conference a while back...they also have one in New Mexico. It looks awesome, but it is wayyyy out of my price range, unfortunately. The workshops are a hundred++ each beyond the cost of the conference, plus the resorts where the conference is to be held is a bit posh. cha-chinnng

(maybe if I were a doctor)

oh well.

:o)”

“Hi Guys I did not read this entire thread, but I recently took a Wilderness First Aid course through Northwest Passage in Wilmette. The course was taught by two EMTs from Wilderness Medical Associates They also offer a Wilderness First Responder course that is more advanced. Take a look at: www.wildmed.com and check out their courses. I am now quaified in Wilderness First Aid, Basci Life Support Skills (CPR etc) and Anaphylaxis Workshop and all cets are valid for 3 years. Check it out.”

“Got CPR/AED certified last night. It was a long course, about 4 hours - but it's a simple technique. I'd encourage anybody to take a course. Anybody can pick it up. Just hope I don't have to use it now. My wife took it too - she's a 6th grade teacher so it could be useful in the school environment.”

“What was the statement

The worst feeling is being there and not knowing what to do.
Good Job Sarge.”

“I'm certified as well. There are times when you know it's just not going to help. That's the worst feeling in the world

I hope you never have to use it, Sarge.
last edited: 8/31/07 5:00:31 AM”

“Sarge, I don't know if you ever paid attention before, but you'll probably notice those AED's are popping up everywhere.

I referee grade school basketball and have been noticing that a LOT of the gyms are starting to have them hanging on a wall somewhere.”

“Having gone into a-fib before I tend to keep an eye out for that sort of thing - even thought about buying one for the house. It's great that they're showing up.

Seems like every year you hear of several kids playing basketball and just collapsing to their death. They even have used that as an example in their commercials before. Have you been certified ductape?”

“I got certified as and EMT-B about 5 years ago. I never really made anything of it, deciding that a business degree was in my better interest. I have however, kept up with my CPR certification because of mostly the reffing, but also because I feel everyone can benefit from being certified.

It is not required of the referees, but I've heard suggestions that it should be of both them and the coaches. I tend to agree that there should at least be a requirement that someone with that knowledge should at least be in the gym.

Kids with physical ailments are showing up on sports teams much more than when I started doing it 10-12 years ago. I'm especially seeing kids with the insulin pump thing, among others. Modern medicine is getting these kids more active, but it also poses more risk, imo, and the leagues should at minimum, encourage certification of the adults around the children the most.”

“To be a certified teacher in MI, you must be CPR/First Aid certified. So, I am.

Those AED's are pretty cool - we were showed how to use one. Pretty simple and user friendly. Hope I never have to use one.”

“I'm a paramedic as well as a CPR instructor and have used CPR and shocked more people than I can remember and I have to tell you all this. While CPR and AED's can and DO save lives everyday, if you're out in the woods hiking and/or backpacking and someone has a heart attack and goes pulseless and aepneic, grabbing your cell phone and calling 911 should be the first thing you think of doing. If someone is in V-fib(ventricular fibrillation), CPR is not going to save them. Electricity is, with the CPR just buying time for the shocks to be delivered. Depending on age, pt's medical and physical condition and how long they've been down, the window is about 10-12 minutes.

If you're in a true "waaay out in the boonies" wilderness with no cell phone service, the outcome isn't good. If there's no cell service but you not too far from a payphone or place where there might be service, send someone running to make the call. Try to be as specific with your location as possible. Start CPR and pray the EMT's or paramedic's get there with their gear fast. And if the person still dies, DON'T BLAME YOURSELF. I can count on one hand how many "saves" I've been a part of, but I don't have enough fingers or toes to count how many people who's "time it was."

Bigben”

“if you're out in the woods hiking and/or backpacking and someone has a heart attack and goes pulseless and aepneic, grabbing your cell phone and calling 911 should be the first thing you think of doing

The course teaches that should be the first thing that's done anyways with adults (over 8 yrs old).”

“Yep. A lot of people "think" they know CPR but aren't certified and have never taken the actual course. A lot of people had a little class at the hospital before they had kids. People might have had a training at their place of employment, a lot of people WERE at one point certified but no longer are and a lot of people are self-educated. Granted, it's not rocket surgery doing CPR, but the lion's share of people who wind up doing bystander CPR are not current AHA certified Providers and may not know or remember to get a call out for help first.”

“"If you're in a true "waaay out in the boonies" wilderness with no cell phone service, the outcome isn't good. If there's no cell service but you not too far from a payphone or place where there might be service, send someone running to make the call. Try to be as specific with your location as possible. Start CPR and pray the EMT's or paramedic's get there with their gear fast. And if the person still dies, DON'T BLAME YOURSELF." ~ BigBen

A truer statement couldn't have been spoken.”

“yeah, just looked up statistics on CPR "success" rates.

Not good.

The AED getting there in less than 5 minutes is key - but even then ... not good.”

“Survival on WITNESSED (that means care started as soon a the person dropped)Cardiacs where CPR alone was used is still around 6 percent...

AED is the way to go....incredibly neat thing too.”

“Would you believe they actually had aed's installed here at my work, then about a year later they have removed them all. So stupid. This is an office full of stressed out over weight sedentary middle aged people. And half of them are smokers. Such a bad idea. I'm sure it was to save the company the expense of keeping them around.”

“Don't worry. I'm sure it will be mandatory some day via Federal law......”

“speaking of which, I need to get recertified. It's been WAY too long.”

“i just recerted first aid, and my cpr recert in on thurs. i heard there have been big changes in cpr.”

“I had to do CPR once. It is not easy to remember the training. It's kind of like trying to play golf on meth amphetamines; you have to keep track of three things at once while dealing with an overload of edrinilan.”

“an overload of what? LOL!”

“Pam, it is!

no pulse checking - less blowing - more pumping”

“thank you sarge! i haven't been on here much lately, so i don't know if i've introduced myself yet, hello! i'm Pamela. everything you want to know about me you can find on my myspace. it's a wonderful myspace, and yes, i am bragging, LOL!

i heard no more blowing at all, which didn't make much sense. did you take a red cross course? because i don't hold much stock in their courses. i always take a hospital course or one taught by firemen/parmedics.”

“I was a certified EMT back in 1978. Not much pay back then, so I went into manufacturing. I taught Red Cross First Aid/CPR/AED up untill 2 years ago. I let my teaching certification go when they no longer let us teach at work. I have taught hundreds of people tho. It was getting where Red Cross tried to idiot proof the course too much. I liked it better when there was more of a challenge.”

“Having been an EMT for 25 years I have done CPR more times than I know. It is true that the survival rates are dismal but the ones that make it make it all worthwhile.”

“Amen flh, I only worked for two years but probably did CPR on patients a dozen times. Most were too far gone when we started, or had too much damage to bring back even with advanced meds. Only one lived for any amount of time. A prominant business owner that I knew. We transported him after he fell one morning and he went into arrest as we got into the city limits. He lived till the next day and died during surgery.
I think the Heimlech manuever is one of the most important things we teach and it has a much better success rate. 100 percent in my experience.”

“Pamela - it's 30 comps + 2 breaths now

I was taught by 2 EMTs.”

“still better than the no breaths at all i heard. a victims best bet is two rescuers then.”

““still better than the no breaths at all i heard. a victims best bet is two rescuers then.”

yeah for several reasons-

1. so one can call 911
2. so one can find an aed ASAP (crucial)
3. so they can switch out on comps w/o burning out”