St. John's Ambulance, Part II

[mousme]

In my copious amounts of spare time, I am thinking of becoming a volunteer for SJA. I would get first-responder training, which will definitely be useful for me in the future. Today's course focused on administering first aid to traumatic injuries (accompanied by videos with stressful music and wonderfully un-hysterical victims who answered questions clearly and concisely and didn't flail or shriek even when they got large foreign objects lodged in their eyes).

I acquired loot in the form of two first-aid kits: one for humans, one for pets (hey, cats can get injured too, especially since my kitties go outside), a book on first-aid for pets (mostly cats and dogs), and SJA's Officia Wilderness First Aid Guide. I read about 50 pages of it on my way home and it's chock-full of pertinent information and useful illustrations. fearsclave and ai731 in particular, you may want to check it out. It has a lot of useful information for providing first-aid for long periods of time (hours to days and even weeks), for those who are traveling or who live in remote areas.

In short, I am now certified in CPR, first-aid, and the use of a commercially-available defibrillator. Not the big medical kind with the paddles, but the small kind with adhesive charge pads. Still, I can now increase someone's chances of surviving respiratory and cardiac failure from 3% to 50%! It's very exciting.

ashforestwalker came by today and now the stairs and the large room in the basement are looking pretty gorgeous. Unfortunately, the weather has not been cooperating with the paint drying, but I hope we'll be able to get this done before ashforestwalker has to go back to his regular job.

Comments

[fearsclave.livejournal.com]

You're certainly adding dots to your character sheet in a big way these days :).

[mousme.livejournal.com]

Hee! Yeah, but not as fast as I'd like, really. Mind you, I am not a patient person. Instant gratification isn't nearly fast enough for my liking. ;)

Next up is to pull together all my RPAL information, get a photo taken, and send in my application for processing.

Then I get a pressure canner, and related equipment. I *really* need to find a proper canning rack, too...

Gah. So much to do, so little time.

[fearsclave.livejournal.com]

Tell me about it; haven't touched the garden in weeks, dammit.

[mousme.livejournal.com]

Neither have I. Thank goodness for all the rain, otherwise I'm sure the garden would have died from lack of water. This weekend is being bookmarked for the Phnee equivalent of a massive air strike against the weeds. :P

[3circledsun.livejournal.com]

Huh, I've never seen a pet first aid kit before.

[mousme.livejournal.com]

Neither had I! It was a very exciting discovery. :D

[sorceror.livejournal.com]

Congratulations! I remember we'd talked about doing the St John's thing, but you're the one who's gone ahead and done it.

I'd still like to, though. Any idea when they're offering their next course?

[mousme.livejournal.com]

No clue. The RCMP actually sprang for my course, as ADD!Supervisor wants us all certified by the end of the year. However, you can call and ask. :)