Aid, Firstly

I’ve not posted on here for around a week, so this is a brief update for the 5 regular readers of my blog and the 70 accidental readers.

I’ve been away from the blog because I’ve been not engaging in the whole Web2 thing, I’ve been busy researching.

I’ve been considering re doing a first aid course and signing up as a First Responder for some time, and I’ve been trying to actually achieve this since I was in Essex about 4 years ago.  For those who are unaware this is what a first responder is:

Firstly, ‘First Responder’ is a term used when reporting incidents.  Used by medical personnel, it simply means the first person to respond to a need for medical assistance, this isn’t what I’m using it to mean.

A first responder in the sense I mean is an Ambulance Service Community First Responder, a volunteer who is supplied with comprehensive training in management of medical emergencies by the Ambulance service in their local area, and who answers so called ‘Category A’ calls made to the emergency operators.  Category A means ‘immediately life threatening’ and to these calls, an ambulance will be sent.  Simulataneously, the dispatcher may send an on duty CFR, and the Responder and Ambulance crews effectively race to the casualty.  Category A calls are largely calls to Myocardial infarctions (Heart Attacks), Cerebro Vascular Accidents or Transient Ishemic Attacks (Both forms of Stroke) and other forms of cardiac crisis like Cardiac Arrest.

Following an incident that causes a Category A call to be made, the gap between the incident and the arrival of aid is the Therapeutic Vacuum, a time during which there is a lack of any therapy for the condition that has ensued.  Ambulance services in the UK aim to reduce this period to 8 min or less, meaning that you should be able to expect an ambulance or alternative response within 8 mins.  A person in cardiac arrest needs attention within the first 10 minutes, and this is why the target is 8 minutes.

In response to the need to improve response times (imagine trying to drive across you home town in 8 minutes!), ambulance services the world over have introduced some kind of alternative responder.  In the UK you may find a response from a motorcycle paramedic, a Fast Response Unit, a Community First Responder or an actual Ambulance with crew.  So the existence of first responders is partly down to a need to tick boxes and meet targets set by government, but is mainly down to a need to get to critical patients ASAP.

I’ve been trying to get to be a FR for some time, and to work in other areas as an event first aider.  Finally this week, I have finally got a response from Wales Ambulance Service with some forms for me to fill out, but it turns out I may need to be a vehicle based FR, rather than the cycle FR I had originally wanted to be (I can cross Swansea faster than any car, and faster than any Ambulance!) so I’m currently in the process of suggesting this idea to the lot at Wales Ambu Trust.  Failing that I guess I have to get a car and so on, although I’m considering a small motorbike, as the license is simpler and the insurance is cheaper.

In the meantime, I’m going to find some cash from somewhere and take the first IHCD qualification, IHCD First Person On Scene, which is a qualification in advanced first aid for people who aren’t ambulance crew, but may find themselves first at an incident.  It carries on after this to IHCD Ambulance Technician, an altogether more complicated course for, guess what, ambulance technicians.  It’s all terribly complicated and so I’m looking into everything carefully before I do it.

Wish me luck!

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1. Aid, Secondly