First Aid In Technical Theatre

[alrivers]

What is a good first aid course for working in technical theatre? st john ambulance and the red cross do HSE first aid at work courses and Emergency first aid at work courses, but which is better? or is there somewhere that will provide more relevant first aid training for theatre?

[Andrew C]

Really difficult to define "better". There are (as I understand it) two official qualifications, coming down to one-day or three day. The one day is pretty basic and is all about CPR, CPR and a little bit of everything else. Three day is CPR, CPR and more of everything else.

 

Your employer is required to have N 3-day first aiders for every X employees once a threshold has been reached. Ask them to train you, down to them what level.

 

My employer, a public school, has decided to train EVERY teacher to one day level, and 3 day for anyone involved in sport, or off site trips. I did 3 day last summer, and it was pretty tedious, and repetitive. I suppose it has to be tailored to get the dimmest builder up to a certain level...

[brainwave-generator]

First Aid at Work is the one to do, it's a legal requirement you have a Qualified FAAW First Aider on site when people are working. The FAAW is the legally recognised qualification to fulfil that purpose.

 

The FAAW is the 3 day course. It's boring and will make you want to kill yourself, but once it's done, that's you qualified for 3 years (which IMHO is utterly ridiculous, I am 24 months into my 36 and I can't remember ANYTHING).

[Jivemaster]

HSE First aid at work is the defacto standard. It should be the same the HSE standard whether delivered by a voluntary body (Red Cross or St John or other) or delivered by a commercial body (training company or ambulance company). The training providers may offer a different mode of delivery though so pick the one that suits your needs. (for example three full days, or six evenings, or others). Yes there is an exam at the end but it is and should be run DDA compliant so reading etc help will be provided.

 

If you are self employed then you have to pay, if you are employed your employer should pay to maintain the specified number of FAW cert holders on site, with allowances for annual leave etc.

 

An expiring FAW can be refreshed in one day, an expired one has to be repeated in full over three days.

[bigclive]

I just did a three day course organised locally by BECTU recently, and as mentioned before it is very repetitive, but that is to ensure it sinks in. I was impressed that they covered the use of AED's (defibrillators) in it.

[the kid]

FWIW "I was impressed that they covered the use of AED's (defibrillators) in it. " is not required at all, and has quite a lot of questions behind how much you need training in one. If YOU need to use one it should be one that exists on a wall to pull off, and it tells you word of word what to do, you need 0 training.

 

The "issue" that my trainer (equine injury specialist + paramedic)in FAAW and our 1st responder had, was the after care, its not a case of throwing on the pads, heart starts, back to normal, if it is serious enough to need a AED you REALLY should know a bit more than standard 1st aid for the after care.

[andy_s]

First Aid at Work is the one to do, it's a legal requirement you have a Qualified FAAW First Aider on site when people are working. The FAAW is the legally recognised qualification to fulfil that purpose.

 

The FAAW is the 3 day course. It's boring and will make you want to kill yourself, but once it's done, that's you qualified for 3 years (which IMHO is utterly ridiculous, I am 24 months into my 36 and I can't remember ANYTHING).

 

Not strictly true. the need for one or more first-aiders on site is down to the employer's risk assessment. This is from the HSE's website:

 

Your employer is expected to have:

 

• 
   
  
• completed a first-aid needs assessment;
  
• ensured that there is either an appointed person to take charge of first-aid arrangements or, if necessary, there are appropriate numbers of suitably trained first-aiders;
  
• ensured their are adequate facilities and a suitable stocked first-aid box;
  
• provided you with information about the first-aid arrangements
  

.

It's worth noting (for accuracy's sake) that the "appointed person" is not required to hold any first-aid qualification. Also note that as I copied/pasted the red words from the HSE FAQ, any spelling mistakes are those of the HSE, not mine.

 

Of course, any risk assessment / first-aid needs assessment for work taking place in technical areas of a theatre or other place of entertainment would recognise the value of and need for suitably trained first-aiders in sufficient numbers to cope with the amount of people - or the number of seperate locations in which work is taking place.

 

The instructors on the course I took recommended that qualified first-aiders would be well-advised to do their own regular revision and keep up the practising during the three years for which the qualification remained valid. The three year refresher period is not because they think people will remember the three day course for three years before it gets wiped from the average memory-bank, but because over a period of three years the training organisations would expect to review and improve the procedures to respond to new ideas.

 

I doubt you're alone in not retaining the information from the training course, but the remedy is in your own hands. If you really can't remember anything after two years, then I suggest getting out the book and the triangular bandage that should have been issued on the course and having a read :** laughs out loud **:

 

e2a web link

[Jivemaster]

As a first aider your early decision is whether to call for professional help. usually it's a good idea to call for an emergency ambulance but often the first few minutes of that golden hour are what counts most towards a positive outcome, so usually it's down to the first attender!

[brainwave-generator]

First Aid at Work is the one to do, it's a legal requirement you have a Qualified FAAW First Aider on site when people are working. The FAAW is the legally recognised qualification to fulfil that purpose.

 

The FAAW is the 3 day course. It's boring and will make you want to kill yourself, but once it's done, that's you qualified for 3 years (which IMHO is utterly ridiculous, I am 24 months into my 36 and I can't remember ANYTHING).

 

Not strictly true. the need for one or more first-aiders on site is down to the employer's risk assessment. This is from the HSE's website:

 

I can't imagine many theatres where the risk assessment wouldn't deem requirement for a first aider on site... which is why I simplified it to 'legal requirement' since it's highly likely that, in this industry, risk assessments will point to first aiders needing to be present.

 

As a side note, an interesting element of our FAAW was after we all passed, our instructor telling us that he advised we never applied any of the knowledge which we had learnt to anybody we didn't fully know and trust; due to the high number of court cases arising from both successful and unsuccessful first aid. As a FAAW you are not obliged to give first aid... the danger of the old 'find a stranger unconcious in the street' scenario is, when doing CPR properly you will most likely break ribs. Upon them being resuscitated and brought back to life, many have been known to sue the first aider for breaking their ribs. Whilst the court cases are seldom successful (in this country... in some countries the success rate is much higher), it can be a stressful time for the first aider. Calling an ambulance and watching them die might be a tad heartless but it keeps your head out of the water.

[Junior8]

I'm with Brainwave-G. Indeed whenever I've done First Aid training in the past I've ended up feeling that in most cases I'd do more harm than good and concluded, like JiveM, that in most cases not moving the patient and calling an ambulance is probably the best I could hope to do. It's OK going on a three day course but unless you are doing First Aid all the time you are bound to forget most of what you are taught rapidly and worse end up with a "1066 and all that" confusion of half remembered lore. The last course I did was by one of the two voluntary societies mentioned by the OP - and all I can say is that the tutor might have been a good first aider but he was a lousy teacher (tedious would have been a positive comment Andrew!) and the cert we all got at the end wasn't worth the paper it was written on.

[kitlane]

I'm with Brainwave-G. Indeed whenever I've done First Aid training in the past I've ended up feeling that in most cases I'd do more harm than good and concluded, like JiveM, that in most cases not moving the patient and calling an ambulance is probably the best I could hope to do. It's OK going on a three day course but unless you are doing First Aid all the time you are bound to forget most of what you are taught rapidly and worse end up with a "1066 and all that" confusion of half remembered lore. The last course I did was by one of the two voluntary societies mentioned by the OP - and all I can say is that the tutor might have been a good first aider but he was a lousy teacher (tedious would have been a positive comment Andrew!) and the cert we all got at the end wasn't worth the paper it was written on.

 

I bet you could remember well enough how to do CPR and stem heavy bleeding. Most other things can wait for the ambulance

[Andrew C]

I did my first training when in the Scouts in America (they teach some fun things there, at the time it might have been a 1/2 day walk to a phone) and 6 years later needed it at a road accident. Enough of it came flooding back to keep a kid safe until the ambulance arrived.

[Junior8]

I bet you could remember well enough how to do CPR and stem heavy bleeding. Most other things can wait for the ambulance

 

Probably (though I'm not certain of that given how poor the teaching was) - which means it might have been better if that's all they'd done.

[the kid]

Do SE do FAW courses ?

 

I did a motorcycle course several years ago, It was GREAT, the very exact methods about moving people should you need to (which is always never unless you REALLY need to) was great, things like that for riggers would be very useful.

[kerry davies]

It is important here to note that First Aid training is an important element of safety at work but that untrained people can save just as many lives by having fixed procedures in place before the accident occurs. Knowing what steps to take following an accident, beginning with step one of raising the alarm, is as vital as any amount of training.

 

Basically, to reinforce the kid's post, it is not advisable to move anyone seriously injured unless they are in danger of further serious injury/death in the position in which you find them. It is essential in motorcycle accidents that you do not even remove full-face helmets until the paramedics arrive.

 

Other members may or may not confirm that riggers should have an aerial rescue trained person on-site when using fall-arrest so there should already be an element of First Aid involved in that.