Accidents requiring first aid treatment are by their very nature immediate and stressful. In any emergency sitaution, your safety as an un-injured group member must come first.

The aim of First aid is to provide Immediate but Temporary Care for a casualty who is ill or injured.

Either you must get medical help to the casualty or the casualty to medical help. Stabilising, monitoring and evacuating casualties are issues you should consider before you have to deal with it.

The subject of First Aid covers a wide variety of topics too extensive to be mentioned in this site. Information can be better obtained from a first aid manual or better still by receiving proper training. The purpose of this page is not to teach first aid but to make the reader aware of the importance of having some knowledge of first aid techniques.

First Aid is a practical subject and there is no substitute for practicing basic accident procedures and looking at specific issues that may arise before you are faced with the real thing. You can't ask a casualty to stop bleeding while you consult your manual becuase you dont know what to do next!

Those who travel to remote areas on adventure holidays or expeditions should seriously consider becoming proficient in and obtaining a first aid qualification from a specialist organisation such as Adventure First Aid. For less demanding situations St. Johns Ambulance or the Red Cross. run courses in first aid locally in most areas.

Most first aid courses run in the UK are designed for the urban work environment. There are few courses that are designed to deal with remote issues. Please see www.adventurefirstaid.co.uk for details of such courses. Having a single strategy to deal with any injury or illness is the key to dealing with immediate and stressfull incidents. Adventure First Aid offers Interactive - Dynamic - Contextual - Cost Effective training.

Since the aim of first aid is to keep a casualty alive and comfortable until medical help arrives or is attained, all travellers should carry a first aid kit, the exact contents of which will be determined by the nature of the trip, the area visited and the activities undertake.

It is also important that you take adequate personal medications relevant to the area and activity undertaken. The interactive page of this web site is there to design a customised medical kit suitable to your particular requirements.
Those venturing away from good medical facilities will need to take a first aid kit, a sterile pack containing needles and syringes and extra medical items such as antibiotics, strong pain killers and other emergency treatments.

Other useful items include; water purification tablets, a sun-block and some insect repellent. See the Main Page for more advice on medical equipment.

Remember, you should always seek medical advice when possible for anything more than simple complaints.

Travel health insurance is essential for all travellers in case of accidents and emergencies requiring medical or hospital treatment abroad. Always check that the costs of repatriation are included.

For a brief outline of basic first aid procedures: