First-aid

First Aid

First-aid is a widely used skill that non healers and career healers may use alike. A suppliment to first-aid is observaton (assessing), gardening (medicating), and tailoring(bandage making).

Basics
The very first thing all healers should be able to do is assess the patient and situation.

First securing safety of both the healer to be and the patient is paramount. If it would endager you to get to the patient, then you compound the issue by adding another person to save.

The next thing we do is ask assessing questions. Example of assessing the patient is asking questions such as:


 * How bad the pain is on a scale of 1-10.
 * What other symptoms are you experiencing.
 * How long has this been going on?

The second way to identify the injury or disease is by the senses.


 * You should smell for blood or unusual odors.


 * You should listen for labored breathing, wheezing, or oral complaints such as moaning and crying.


 * You should look for bruising, abrasion, irritations, or open wounds.


 * You should feel on and around the wound for further damage.

After you have all available information you can make a diagnosis.

Advanced
After assessing the patient you should know if you are capable of treating the wound or illness. If you are not capable then your first duty is to find someone who can.

Bleeding should be the number one concern. Once more than half of the blood is drained from the body the person has a lesser chance to recover and may even die from blood lose alone. To stop this from happening simply apply firm direct press to the site of the bleeding. Do not remove cloth from the wound as this will re-open any attempt the body has made to heal itself. Just keep applying firm pressure and adding more cloth if you are concerned about bleeding through.

Shock is another issue. If the person is in severe pain or fear they will have a hard time to recover and may develope side effects such as tremor, memory loss, and fever. To counter shock it is best to be as calm as possible and make the patient as comfortable as can be.

Moving is the final issue. A person may be seriously injuried and inproper movement or adjustment make cause a fracture to break, a sprain to tear, or a broken bone to puncture organs. The only thing to do is secure the injury and ensure it doesn't move during transportation.