Hey, guys whether it’s backpacking, hiking, fishing, camping or whatever you do a first aid kit is an essential piece of equipment when tracking into the great outdoors and there are different kits for different purposes. You could have a first aid kit for your home, your car, your work but in this video we’ll be looking at a wilderness first aid kid.
When you're out in the wilderness you're logging it around. So it should some be small and compact. It should be lightweight and it still should cover all the essentials of first aid. I’ll show and explain some of the different items in my wilderness first aid kit. Also, I will be showing you some different containers to carry and store these items. This is my kit that you guys are looking at and I do take it at most places I go including regular places not just out in the woods.
Everybody’s kit is going to differ a little bit depending on your needs. I suggest that you make your own kit and do not buy a store box kit because you need to know exactly what's in the kit and by building it yourself you'll know exactly. And if you do buy a store made kit, make sure you go through it thoroughly and see what's in there and add the things you think are necessary.
Okay, the first thing I'm going to show you is probably one of the most important and valuable items you can put in your first aid kit. This is instant guide to first aid which shows you all different kinds of injuries and the ways you can treat them, the symptoms. This is very valuable and it will definitely help you at one time or another. I don’t care if you print it off the internet, if you ripped it out of a book, just put some basic first aid information in your kit.
Next were going to go over band aids and bandages. And as you know it’s basically they cover and protect your wound or cut. In the outdoors I would recommend going for waterproof Band Aids and durable Band Aids for obvious reasons and remember here is a little tip. You use a large Band Aids to cover small and large cuts but you can't use small bandage to cover large cuts. So think about that when you're putting your kit together and again these are the large ones. These are good for your knees or whatever. These are butterfly bandages. These are good for say you need stitches but you can't receive the proper medical attention. This should seal off your wound. These are gauze pads. You can use this with the waterproof first aid tape to cover wounds.
Again there are all different sizes and shapes of Band Aids and bandages. It’s good to have a good assortment of them and here I have an iPod. I hope I never need to use this because that would really stop.
The next item is actually a pretty new thing to my first aid kit. It’s called the Quikclot and it’s meant to clot our blood very fast in case you have a really bad gush. It’s like a sponge that you put on your wound and like it says it will stop bleeding fast. It’s made by Z-Medica and this is probably one of the most expensive things in my first aid kit. This medium size one was $10.00 and again the same rule applies as the bandages. You can put a large one of this small cut but you can't put a small one of this on a large cut and this could possibly save your life someday.
If you're out in the wilderness and you can't receive medical attention and you're bleeding badly you need some way to stop it so I’d rather have this with me than not. So, I've never used it. I'm glad I haven't but I would definitely recommend adding this to you first aid kit.
These are first aid antiseptics. You need to have this in your first aid kit. It’s not an option. What they do for those who don’t know is sterilized your wounds and kill the bacteria making it so your wound won’t become infected. There are different kinds. There is alcohol. There is iodine and there is this squeeze tube. Some people know this as like Neosporin. I bought the store brands because they had the same active ingredient. Some of them have pain relief, antibiotic but they all pretty much do the same thing sterilized your wounds and keep them from getting infected.
The iodine is a good option because you can use this to purify water but before you do that, look it up online, the exact measurements because this could be poisonous. These are different medications, pain killers and one of them is oral gel which numbs your teeth if you have a toothache but basically if you have a prescription you need to put some of that in your first aid kit. If you get lost in the woods and depending on what your prescription is you’re definitely going to need it. So definitely put a few or how ever much you think is necessary.
Also, this is what I have in mine but you guys can put whatever you feel is necessary. I have some Tylenol, Imodium, oral gel for toothaches. Like I said everyone’s kit varies so put what you think you need and also I wanted to say if you ever get prescription pain killers prescribed to you legally by a doctor by all means, use what you need to get well from your surgery or whatever but if you have some leftover, save them for your kit because you might need them someday and you’ll be glad you did.
And then lastly are some miscellaneous items that you should add to your first aid kit. This is mole skin. It’s for blisters on your feet. Just cut off a piece and it will stick on and it will protect the blister from rubbing against your shoe. A lot of people use this and it’s a very good thing to have.
Gloves, who knows you might have touch somebody else bleeding or whatever. Gloves are always good to have. You can also carry water in them if you had too. Super glue you can use to seal a wound, a bad cut or something until you can receive proper medical attention. Also it has a hundred other uses and tweezers also have many uses.
You can pull out splinters, pull off ticks. Scissors are an extremely valuable item, so many different uses. These ones fold up nice and compact for your kit. Razor blades or scalpels, you might need those at some point remember to sterilize them. This is just a little water dropper, you can use it to flush out a dirty wound and this is a one use thermometer to see what you're body temperature is.
Now I have decent first aid kit in the outdoors. It could put your life in jeopardy especially if you were in a survival situation. Chances are you might not have medical attention for days and this kit could save your life and like I said in the beginning our first aid kit is an essential piece of equipment to bring with you in the outdoors. It could save yours or somebody else’s life someday, thank you for watching.
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