A survey of my friends indicated that most of them have enough guns and ammo for 10 years, food for a month, water and cash for a few days, and completely inadequate medical supplies. Then of course we have Mormon friends who have a year of food but were not necessarily better prepared or educated about medical problems.
But I felt I was woefully under prepared when it came to medical resources. A lot of medical information is now accessed via www, so the first thing I did was to buy a comprehensive medical resource book. I got the usual Army combat-arms training which is pretty good when it comes to trauma but felt I could learn a lot more. The Wilderness First Responder course would have been ideal - but it's 8 straight days, wasn't going to happen.
There are two Wilderness First Aid courses commonly available - one from SOLO in NH and the other from Wildmed in Maine. They both offer this and other courses at a variety of locations. Wildmed also has a three day Advanced Wilderness First Aid class but wasn't offered at a convenient location for me. So I took the equally well-regarded course from SOLO on Thompson's Island. BTW SOLO and Wildmed fans are kind of like Bruins/Canadiens.
This course is also a recertification course for Wilderness First Responders. I thought that might be a bad thing, but it turns out that a lot of them had practical experience in all kinds of situations, and proved quite good when it came to assessing problems and developing solutions.
"Front country" first aid often assumes that medical professionals are accessible within the "Golden Hour." Even a lot of Army first aid practices assume the casualty will be evacuated or at least under care of a Medic in short order.
This course assumes you won't have access to medical professionals and that you will be hours away from any help at all. Obviously in two days they don't go into brain surgery, but they put out a lot of practical information.
I coach youth lacrosse, ride a motorcycle, and sail with the family, so this training should be helpful in supporting all of those activities. I'm going to build up my first aid kits now based on this training and input from the others.
I highly recommend these courses.
http://www.soloschools.com/
http://www.wildmed.com/
But I felt I was woefully under prepared when it came to medical resources. A lot of medical information is now accessed via www, so the first thing I did was to buy a comprehensive medical resource book. I got the usual Army combat-arms training which is pretty good when it comes to trauma but felt I could learn a lot more. The Wilderness First Responder course would have been ideal - but it's 8 straight days, wasn't going to happen.
There are two Wilderness First Aid courses commonly available - one from SOLO in NH and the other from Wildmed in Maine. They both offer this and other courses at a variety of locations. Wildmed also has a three day Advanced Wilderness First Aid class but wasn't offered at a convenient location for me. So I took the equally well-regarded course from SOLO on Thompson's Island. BTW SOLO and Wildmed fans are kind of like Bruins/Canadiens.
This course is also a recertification course for Wilderness First Responders. I thought that might be a bad thing, but it turns out that a lot of them had practical experience in all kinds of situations, and proved quite good when it came to assessing problems and developing solutions.
"Front country" first aid often assumes that medical professionals are accessible within the "Golden Hour." Even a lot of Army first aid practices assume the casualty will be evacuated or at least under care of a Medic in short order.
This course assumes you won't have access to medical professionals and that you will be hours away from any help at all. Obviously in two days they don't go into brain surgery, but they put out a lot of practical information.
I coach youth lacrosse, ride a motorcycle, and sail with the family, so this training should be helpful in supporting all of those activities. I'm going to build up my first aid kits now based on this training and input from the others.
I highly recommend these courses.
http://www.soloschools.com/
http://www.wildmed.com/
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