WHAT SHOULD GO IN MY FIRST AID KIT REFILL?

April is first aid kit refill month at First Aid Supplies Online, so this is probably a good time to explore what constitutes and quality first aid kit refill. Although best first aid practices are universal it is usually approached from slightly different perspectives.

Workplace first aid should consider not only best practices but OSHA regulations and ANSI standards as well. For the record, we recommend that you don’t be limited by these governmental standards even if you are refilling a workplace first aid kit. Those government regulations establish what they call the “minimum requirement for a workplace first aid kit.” We covered those requirements in previous blog posts and you can read them here:

Suffice it to say that all of our industrial first aid refill kits are stocked to meet or exceed these requirements and address standard first aid best practices. We like to refer all of our business customers to our do-it-yourself interactive order form and first aid inventory worksheet.

Having that distinction in mind, here are the basics on what to put in your first aid kit from the ground up. For clarity what we are discussing in this article is first aid, which is the assistance you render to any person who is suffering a sudden illness or injury. The focus of this assistance would be to sustain the life, prevent the condition from worsening, comfort and assist until medical attention can be obtained.

Although the definition is short, the reality can be overwhelming or exceedingly simple. So, we recommend being prepared for the worst and then bulk up on the stuff you are going to use on a day to day basis like adhesive bandages, antiseptics, instant cold packs, burn gel, and assorted gauze compresses, tapes and wraps.

Make sure you have one or more wound & trauma compresses for serious bleeding. There are also some exciting new products to help control bleeding which we recommend you look in to stop bleeding products subcategory.

Once you are confident that you have the bleeding control adequately addressed then you should consider CPR next. A good quality CPR Resuscitator is recommended but you could get by with a basic CPR Shield too depending upon budget and size constraints.

Whether or not you have been trained in CPR and first aid you should have on hand one good basic first aid guide to help you through a situation you are not familiar with.

We’ve already mentioned the consumable tapes, wraps and gauze which you can mix and match to your particular requirements so let’s move on to burns.

Most first aid guides will tell you to flush minor burns in cold water and I can speak from experience when I tell you that this is a very effective treatment for the minor burn.  The problem with this treatment is that there isn’t always a cold-water source around.  That’s why we recommend you put some hydrogel burn products in all of your first aid kits.  Hydrogels were invented back in the 1980’s and they have revolutionized first aid burn treatment.

One other consideration would be a rescue blanket to keep the injured warm. This will come in very handy if you are treating this person for shock.