Buy or build a Home First Aid Kit

[Jeffjones297]

Construct compile your own, most first aid kits are worthless and don't contain what you need, besides plasters and have stuff you'll never use/need.

[jansman]

Construct compile your own, most first aid kits are worthless and don't contain what you need, besides plasters and have stuff you'll never use/need.

Agreed. However,I would say that first aid training is MORE important! With the knowledge of treatment,one can adapt with equipment available. As an example,I was a career butcher of 42 years. I sure saw some injuries over that time! I can remember a lad catching two fingers into a slicer . A first aid kit was a waste of time.I literally tightened a clean cloth around his fingers,wrapped a clean towel,arm up and put a bandage on his arm quickly.on that bandage ( on and above elbow) I tightened a length of beef butchering rope as a tourniquet. The ambulance arrived quickly and took over.
That’s training.

[Jeffjones297]

It depends on the training, a one day course is quickly forgotten, all you'll remember is about burns and choking and elevating wounds and what to do in a case of shock, if you're lucky.
Yearly refreshers are the way to go, to keep the knowledge fresh and implanted.
I am lucky, I was a nurse for 34 yrs and worked in many varied dept's, including a & e.
But then again, I knew nurses who didn't have a clue and we're useless in an emergency. A cool head is often what's required and the confidence to use it.

[jansman]

It depends on the training, a one day course is quickly forgotten, all you'll remember is about burns and choking and elevating wounds and what to do in a case of shock, if you're lucky.
Yearly refreshers are the way to go, to keep the knowledge fresh and implanted.
I am lucky, I was a nurse for 34 yrs and worked in many varied dept's, including a & e.
But then again, I knew nurses who didn't have a clue and we're useless in an emergency. A cool head is often what's required and the confidence to use it.

The training was appropriate- after all,first aid is to ( hopefully) keep someone alive until the expert professional (s) arrive. I was a butcher,not a doctor!

[PrepDad]

Ive just bought my third one of these
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Compact-Emerge ... hdGY&psc=1

Initially bought one for the house, then one for my car and then one for the wifes car!
Maybe abit on the large side for most but its really well organised labelled which makes refilling easy.
Ive managed to "upgrade" mine with leatherman raptor shears, celox granules, SWAT-T Tourniquet, trauma dressings and a decent supply of aspirin etc the bag seems to cope well with all the extra bits in it too!!

[Arzosah]

Ive just bought my third one of these
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Compact-Emerge ... hdGY&psc=1

Initially bought one for the house, then one for my car and then one for the wifes car!
Maybe abit on the large side for most but its really well organised labelled which makes refilling easy.
Ive managed to "upgrade" mine with leatherman raptor shears, celox granules, SWAT-T Tourniquet, trauma dressings and a decent supply of aspirin etc the bag seems to cope well with all the extra bits in it too!!

I like the labels - that's very interesting, I could do that myself with an existing day ruck I don't like for its original purpose.

[Frnc]

My home one is a St Johns workplace, prob small workplace, plus a few extras. It all lives in a clean, obviously, washing up bowl. Mostly. A few things on the shelf next to it. The St Johns is a good starting point, and a good case. I've had to update some of the contents. You can buy the dressings individually from them or on Amazon, or use other brands. I don't think I have any tourniquets but I do have the breathing things. Not really sure how or when you use them tbh. Need to up my skills a bit.

[PPrep]

I bought a basic first aid kit from eBay for about £10. This is very good value, but I've added extra steri - strips, a thermometer with spare batteries, better quality plasters and a small bottle of disinfectant. This is in line with my low level of First Aid knowledge. There's also a much smaller kit for my car, and a tiny first aid kit in my EDC (which I don't use as I should). I've found over the years that over - the - counter painkillers, so called, are practically useless and don't use them.

[Yorkshire Andy]

I bought a basic first aid kit from eBay for about £10. This is very good value, but I've added extra steri - strips, a thermometer with spare batteries, better quality plasters and a small bottle of disinfectant. This is in line with my low level of First Aid knowledge. There's also a much smaller kit for my car, and a tiny first aid kit in my EDC (which I don't use as I should). I've found over the years that over - the - counter painkillers, so called, are practically useless and don't use them.

I keep a bigger kit in my car geared more towards big injuries sadly when 1.5 tonnes of corned beef tin hits something / someone your beyond wet wipes and Elastoplast .. big dressings lots of foil blankets to treat/ try and prevent shock and ideally some catastrophic bleeding kit such as tourniquets as skin / bone / muscle really doesn't take kindly to is interaction with steel (friend lost her leg in a car vs motorbike rtc) ....

Obviously training really helps too more knowledge over kit you can use a clean t shirt as a wound compress if pushed or a triangle bandage and a spanner as a emergency torniquet but when seconds count you can get a torniquet on faster than getting the fak out the car boot

[Medusa]

The zip on my first aid bag has broken so need to find a replacement, plenty of them around, just trying to work out which one I prefer. My emergency first aid at work runs out at the end of the year and will need to be retaken. One of my daughters phoned last week to tell me that she had saved her partners life, he was choking. Unable to breathe or cough, she managed to do the back blows hard enough to disloge the obstruction just before she was about to do the abdominal thrusts. She is a former carer and I was so pleased that she recalled her first aid training and encouraged her to renew her training and her partner to attend a course too.