We say it every first aid curse we run. I cant believe how many parents don’t do first aid courses in Canberra. Its basic life skills that will save your family members life. Book in today people. Do a first aid course in Canberra. Canberra First Aid and Training. First Aid is the best. First aid courses are better than any other activity you will do this year.
WHEN Amy Michelle and her family sat down for dinner they had no idea of the drama that would unfold.
As they ate their meal, a scary thing happened.
“My daughter choked and was unable to have an effective cough, and she turned blue,” Ms Michelle said.
“Somehow my brain clicked and I remembered my first aid training, requiring back and chest blows. Luckily I was able to clear her airway.”
Alyssa recovered but her mother decided to take her to the hospital for an assessment.
“The hospital said she was lucky and it was a good outcome,” Ms Michelle said.
The positive outcome was less about luck and more about training.
Ms Michelle moved to Casino a year ago from Melbourne. She trained as a registered nurse years ago and also did an essential first aid course recently which should be undertaken every two years.
She urged people to do a first aid course.
“You never know when something like this is going to occur. I’m just glad Alyssa is alive,” she said.
“If I didn’t have first aid knowledge, my daughter would be dead.”
Here is a good little article with lots of basic first aid procedures. Make sure you book in to a full first aid course though so that you can keep your accreditation up to date. First aid courses can deliver you with all of the skills that you need. In Canberra we feel that we train the best first aid courses so book in now.
HERE are the latest tips on how to treat the most common and serious medical conditions so you’ll know exactly what to do if one strikes.
BURN
“The number-one solution for a burn is 20 minutes under cool running water,” Peter LeCornu, national training manager at St John Ambulance Australia, says. “After that, cover it with a loose, non-stick dressing. If the burn is bigger than a 20-cent piece, see your doctor or a pharmacist. If it’s bigger than the palm of your hand, head straight to hospital.” Do not use ice or apply lotions, ointment or fat to the burn. If the burn is deep, seek urgent medical advice.
CANCER DIAGNOSIS
“If you’ve just received a cancer diagnosis, acknowledge that feeling a range of different emotions is normal,” Nicole Cook, clinical psychologist at Sydney’s MindFrame Psychology, says. “It can be quite overwhelming to think of all the ‘what ifs’, so try to stay in the moment. Discuss the diagnosis with whoever you feel most comfortable talking to. That could be friends and family or a counsellor. If someone close to you has received a cancer diagnosis, listen. It might not feel like much but it’s the best thing you can do.”
PANIC ATTACK
Picture: iStock
“Panic attacks can be overwhelming and scary,” Cook says. “The first thing is to remind yourself you’re not in danger and encourage calm thoughts. A panic attack will cause rapid, shallow breathing, so try to counter that with slow belly breathing. If panic attacks are happening often enough to significantly impact your life or cause debilitating fear, see a psychologist.”
CHOKING
“Give the person five sharp blows to the middle of their back using the heel of your hand. Failing that, give them five chest thrusts – stand next to them with the heel of one hand on the lower half of their sternum and one in the middle of their back and thrust,” LeCornu says. If a child is choking, use back blows. Don’t tip them upside down or put your fingers in their mouth or throat.
SUNBURN
“Prevention is always the best cure,” associate professor Chris Baker, president of the Australasian College of Dermatologists, says. “But if you get caught out and are suffering from mild sunburn, use a simple moisturiser, such as sorbolene, and a cold compress on the area. Simple is best when it comes to after-sun lotions, and I’d avoid anything that’s highly perfumed or has an anaesthetic agent in it.”
HEARTBURN
Picture: iStock
“Mild heartburn can often settle with a glass of milk and rest,” GP Dr Elizabeth Sturgiss says. “For anything more severe, use over-the-counter tablets or liquids.” If that fails, seek urgent medical advice to rule out a more serious issue.
FEVER
Picture: iStock
“A fever is considered temperatures above 38˚C,” Sturgiss explains. “If you have a fever for more than 48 hours or if paracetamol isn’t helping to bring it down, make an appointment to see your doctor. If, however, you have a fever as well as neck stiffness, difficulty with bright lights, a bruise-like rash, drowsiness or confusion, get to the hospital. Exercising to ‘sweat out a fever’ is a myth so don’t try it. Children with fevers should be seen by a doctor as soon as possible.”
ALLERGIC REACTION
“The most common form of allergic reaction is hayfever, which can cause sneezing, itchy eyes and nose, and a runny or blocked nose,” Sturgiss says. “If you’re having these symptoms for the first time, see your doctor to confirm the diagnosis. Then, over-the-counter medicines and steroid nasal sprays will help relieve symptoms. An acute allergic reaction can be caused by a range of things and cause a number of different symptoms, from itchy rashes and sneezing right through to life-threatening airway swelling and breathing difficulties. If it’s a severe allergic reaction, call an ambulance and give the person first aid while you wait for it to arrive.”
DIARRHOEA
“Keep well hydrated by drinking a combination of water and electrolyte solutions frequently,” Sturgiss says. “It’s also important to rest. If you’ve had ongoing diarrhoea for 48 hours, it’s worthwhile visiting your GP. If you’re vomiting too, don’t leave it any longer than 12 hours before seeing a doctor.”
TICK BITE
Picture: iStock
“It’s crucial you get the whole tick out, so only try to remove it if you’ve got tick-removal forceps,” LeCornu advises. “With normal tweezers, it’s really easy to get the body out but you often leave the head behind. If you don’t have the right forceps, get to a doctor.”
SPRAIN
Picture: iStock
“The message is simple: R-I-C-E,” LeCornu says. “That is, rest, ice, compression and elevation. Sit down with an icepack on the area for 15 minutes every two hours for the first 24 hours. Also use a compression bandage on the area for at least 48 hours and elevate it for as long as you can.”
MIGRAINE
Picture: iStock
“Make sure it’s a migraine and not a bad headache, which can be treated with paracetamol or ibuprofen,” Sturgiss says. “Migraines tend to be on one side of the head and they throb. The best thing for migraines is aspirin washed down with coffee. We think spasms in the brain vessels cause migraines, and the aspirin and coffee work together to dilate them and relieve the pain.”
FAINTING
“If someone blacks out with no warning, they should see a doctor immediately,” Sturgiss says. “But if someone feels they’re about to faint and then does, it’s less serious. Put them flat on their back on the floor with their feet up at a right angle. If they don’t wake in a few minutes, call an ambulance. If they do wake, keep them lying flat for 5-10 minutes and then ease them up gently. Have them sip some fluids. If they’re acting oddly or feeling unwell, call an ambulance.”
OPEN WOUND
“The first step is to put gloves on to reduce the risk of infection,” LeCornu says. “If the area is bleeding, stop it by applying pressure. Then use water or saline and sterile gauze to clean the area and get any nasties out. After that, apply a soft, dry dressing. If the wound can’t be cleaned or if there’s something stuck in there, that’s when you should head to the doctor.”
CONCUSSION
“Concussion is the result of a head injury so it always needs to be treated seriously,” LeCornu says. “I’d call an ambulance straight away and then keep the person lying down until the ambulance arrives.”
CONSTIPATION
“Increasing your fibre intake with more vegetables, whole fruit with the skin on and wholegrains, as well as upping water intake, should be the first step,” Sturgiss says. “Exercise also gets the bowels moving.” If that fails, see your doctor.
URINARY TRACT INFECTION
“Book in to see your doctor,” Sturgiss says. “While you’re waiting, keep your fluids up so your urine is almost clear – that will help flush the bugs through. You can also get effervescent drink sachets that will make your urine less acidic so it’s less painful.”
DEPRESSIVE EPISODE
“People who are depressed tend to think negatively and be self-critical so an easy tip is to ask yourself whether you’d talk to a friend in the same situation as you’re talking to yourself,” Cook says. “Writing your thoughts down and trying to challenge them can also help. So can exercise because it improves mood and sleep quality. Last of all, ask for help – it’s never too soon.”
CHEST PAIN
“Chest pain that lasts for a few seconds is something that should be followed up with your doctor,” Sturgiss says. “But if chest pain lasts more than a few minutes or comes with difficulty breathing, racing heart or feeling unwell, call an ambulance quickly.”
STOMACH ACHE
Picture: iStock
We’ve all had that queasy feeling but Sturgiss says, “Severe or persistent tummy pains should be discussed with your doctor, who will do a comprehensive assessment of your medical history and a physical examination. There’s no common remedy for a stomach ache and they can be caused by so many different things so it’s really important to get to the bottom of the cause.”
TOOTHACHE
Picture: iStock
“Even a mild toothache warrants a visit to your dentist,” Dr Gary Smith, president of the Australian Dental Association Queensland, says. “The most likely cause of a toothache is sensitivity, decay or a cavity, all of which need treatment. Other causes include fractures, gum disease and even things unrelated to the teeth such as sinus infections and heart disease. Have regular check-ups.”
ASTHMA ATTACK
“If a person is having an acute asthma attack, they will have difficulty breathing, trouble speaking and may even collapse,” Sturgiss says. “Help them use their puffers and call an ambulance. If someone has undiagnosed asthma and is experiencing wheezing, coughing or breathlessness when exercising, they should book in to see their GP. It’s also especially important for people with asthma to avoid cigarette smoke.”
* If you or someone else is in need of urgent medical help, call 000. For 24-hour health advice and info: Health Direct, 1800 022 022. For 24-hour mental health support: Lifeline, 13 11 14.
Make sure you get in to one of our famous first aid courses held in Canberra. We provide our students with nationally recognised certificates for all first aid courses attended. Our first aid courses are the best in Canberra and we offer a range of online learning before your practical training session. We look forward to seeing you and hope that yu read al of our first aid courses testimonials.
WHEN a red-bellied black snake is hungry, not even the world’s second-most-venomous land snake can escape the menu.
On Saturday Sean Shaw captured footage on his phone of a red-bellied black snake chasing down and digesting a brown snake on a dirt road near Myponga.
In the video the red-bellied black snake, with a more-than-handy size advantage, clamps down on the smaller reptile, injecting its venom.
The brown snake tries desperately to retaliate, but cannot penetrate the scales of its hunter, despite trying again and again.
Mr Shaw — who used to work for Adelaide Snake Catchers — said he first saw the red-bellied black chase the brown snake over the road as he drove past, and stopped to film the fight.
“After about a 20-minute tussle the red-bellied black snake eventually was able to swallow the brown snake,” he said.
The red-bellied black snake clamps down on the brown snake. Picture: Sean ShawThe brown snake tries to fight back. Picture: Sean Shaw
“The whole episode took maybe half an hour.
“When we left the brown snake was about half swallowed but (the red-bellied) seemed to have stalled!”
While shocking, snake catcher Corey Renton, from Snakeaway Services, says it’s not that uncommon.
“Red-bellies are actually reptile eaters,” Mr Renton said.
“Brown snakes much prefer rodents while red-bellies eat frogs and lizards, they live in dams and creeks naturally.”
Red-bellied black snakes are dangerous to humans but their bites are not usually life threatening.
We have students every week in our first aid course ask about blue bottle stings. these are one of the most common stings that occur especially in summer when everyone is at the beach. Please learn the correct first aid course techniques by attending one of our cheap but effective first aid courses. We complete our first aid courses at the Dickson Tradies.
A 15-year-old girl was stung in ten places by bluebottles last month, as ambulance bosses revealed more than one person a week was hospitalised by marine life across the northern beaches last year.
Bluebottles were the most common culprit, with 43 calls for ambulances due to the creatures including for the girl, who was injured on December 5.
Sophie Bowman 4 checking out the bluebottles on Fairlight Beach in 2014. Picture: Bradley Hunter
She was stung across her legs, hips and stomach at Manly.
Last February, a 25-year-old male was also taken to hospital after struggling to breathe at Narrabeen, after being stung.
Meanwhile, three people who were stung by jellyfish in 2016 called ambulances, one person was the victim of an octopus sting, while 29 people were stung by stingrays, which are notorious in Pittwater.
A bluebottle jellyfish. Picture: Kit Wise
There were four stingray cases on December 30 alone across NSW, including a 55-year-old man who was stung at Ku-ring-gai Chase.
There were no incidents involving sharks in the area, which covers Sydney Harbour Bridge to Palm Beach.
The figures are the highest overall out of Sydney’s four ambulance districts.
However, while bosses said bluebottles are a part of summer, brought in to beaches by northeast winds, stings should be taken seriously.
Manly Daily reader Kim De Kock’s image of Bluebottles at Little Manly
NSW Ambulance paramedic Matt Burke said: “Bluebottle stings can induce a potential anaphylactic or severe reaction in some people, particularly if there is any immune compromise.
“If you get a series of stings or if you get stung around the airway, you can get some swelling and some possible airway compromise.”
He said it was important to remove the affected person from the water and perform basic first aid as soon as possible, and call triple-0 if necessary.
The figures from across NSW show ocean bites and stings peaked in January and February.
Bluebottle washed on the beach. Picture: Regi Varghese
WHAT TO DO
Bluebottles Rinse area with seawater to remove remaining stings, place in hot water
Stingrays Place in hot water, control any bleeding with pressure; if the barb is embedded, do not remove it, but get to hospital
Blue-ringed octopus Apply a pressure immobilisation bandage and get to hospital
Good fast thinking by the local on scene. Wasn’t needed but with the increase in children being locked in cars I can understand someone smashing the window. If you do need to complete cpr on someone it is great to have done the training. Book in to a first aid course in Canberra now with us at Canberra First Aid. Our first aid courses are excellent teaching you a range of first aid skills in a safe and relaxed environment.
Ben Guarino
A US police officer smashed a car window to rescue a baby, only to discover it was a doll. Photo: Roger Whiteway
Lieutenant Jason Short believed he was about to save a life.
A 911 call – someone had spotted a baby left alone in a car on a hot July day – prompted the US police officer to rush to the Walmart shopping plaza in Keene, New Hampshire. There, just as the call had said, he spied an infant in a car: a blanket, a bottle and finally two bare feet, motionless, emerging from beneath the fabric.
He drew his baton, smashed the window and saved the child.
Ainslie, the doll ‘rescued’ by police.
Something was wrong. He described the infant as appearing lifeless or dead. Short began administering CPR. It did not work. He called for an ambulance, and then he checked for an obstructed airway.
“And I went to put my finger in its mouth and it was all resistance,” he said to WMUR-TV. “And I’m like, ‘This is a doll.'” He called the ambulance again, to relay its services were no longer needed.
The doll, as it turned out, belonged to a Vermont resident named Carolynne Seiffert. That the figure was so realistic was not a mistake. Seiffert, whose 20-year-old son died in 2005 from Hunter’s disease, collects lifelike dolls as a form of coping with the loss. She owns about 40 of them.
Such dolls are known as reborn dolls, mimics of human babies in exquisite artificial detail. Many start out as regular, $30-a-pop toys, although the end product can fetch thousands of dollars. As The New York Times described in 2005, in the processes of “reborning” a doll the item is first dismantled, cleaned of paint and recoloured, “often using a blue that helps the artist achieve a realistically veiny look. Glass eyes may be substituted for the original plastic ones. Hair is removed and replaced, sometimes with hand-implanted mohair or even human hair. ” To simulate the weight of a real infant, the doll’s body cavity may be filled with pellets.
There is little medical research into the value of reborn dolls for grief. But columnist and psychiatrist Gail Saltz wrote at Today in 2008 that dolls may act as transitional objects, items that help overcome a sense of abandonment. “For some women, such a transitional object eases them into ways of finding more external methods of dealing with their needs of caretaking and loving a being who loves them back,” Saltz wrote. “It is the concretised fantasy of getting unconditional love.”
Seiffert, who named the $2,000 doll Ainsley, sent a statement to WMUR, saying that “I’ve been laughed at and embarrassed by all the fuss,” and, “You can’t know how people choose to deal with their losses in life.”
Keene Police Chief Brian Costa said he would pay the $300 to fix Seiffert’s window. He supported Officer Short’s actions.
“If all indications are that a baby is in a car in upward of well over 90-degree weather,” he said to the Union Leader, officers will break car windows. This is not the first time emergency responders have broken car windows to save what turned out to be dolls; police recommend that such items are left in car trunks so as to be completely out of view, or taken with their owners.
Being left alone in a parked car can be dangerous to young children. By the last week of July 2016, 21 children, many younger than 2, died of heat exposure after being left unattended in a car in the US. The annual average is 37 deaths.
“I would never assume that it’s a doll,” Short said to WMUR. “I would always assume that it’s a child. I would never do anything different.”
Seiffert said she will affix a sign to her car, to warn other would-be rescuers to leave her windows unbroken as Ainsley is not real.
Since Christmas Day in NSW, four children aged under five have drowned – three in pools and one in a fish pond.
SLSQ Academy Operations Manager, Ken Clark, said while prompt calls to triple zero are “wonderful”, CPR from a knowledgeable bystander could save lives.
“The first four to eight minutes are crucial,” he said.
Mr Clark said it’s often after a tragedy that people wish they had the skills to perform CPR.
“People say “oh I wish I had done that class, I’ve been wanting to for ages but never got around to it’,” he said.
Part of the benefit of CPR training, Mr Clark said, is that it gives people the confidence to help out in the case of an emergency – a skill all backyard pool owners should have.
“What it does do is it gives you the skills to be a first aider – in your mind, you say ‘I can do this’,” he said.
“Any attempt at resuscitation is better than no attempt but there’s nothing like practice, so good CPR is even better.”
While proper pool fencing and a secure gate is also vital to prevent backyard drownings, Mr Clark emphasised that parents must still watch their kids.
“You’ve got to supervise the kids,” he said.
“But teaching them to swim is the first thing.”
The drownings have prompted calls for swimming lessons to be mandatory in all Australian primary schools.
In an opinion piece for Fairfax Media, YMCA NSW chief executive Leisa Hart said all Australian kids “deserve the skills to survive”.
“Astonishingly, it’s thought that three out of five Australian children leave primary school without basic swimming skills,” Ms Hart said.
Ms Hart said the government, schools, Surf Life Saving Australia, the Royal Life Saving Society Australia and other organisations need to work together to teach children water safety.
For Certain! Every pool owner needs to have completed CPR in a first aid course. It costs minimal and it will save your family members life. Make sure you book in early to our first aid course as we are booking out around 1 week before course dates now. Our first aid course is excellent. Our first aid course is cheap. Our first aid course is the best in Canberra. Boo in to our first aid course now.
