Basic life support and defibrillator use, Emergency First Aid, First Aid at Work, First Aid at Work Re-validation, +F Forestry First Aid, Outdoor First Aid and Professional Outdoor First Aid…….which course fo you need if you live and work in the Scottish Highlands?
It does seem very confusing with so many course names, often very similar sounding, that you may wonder how you choose the right one.
We can help. But let’s talk about lego first.
Think of a first aid course as made up of lego bricks. Lego bricks can be put together to make a house, a car or castle. But in the end they are still the same lego bricks. Take the house or car apart and put them together to make a castle.
The ITC first aid qualifications are a bit like those lego bricks. You can put them together to make a first aid course suitable for an office. You can add a few more bricks and you have a course designed for people working with machines. Add another brick and you get first aid for forestry commission land or fish farms.
So which combination of first aid lego bricks is right for you or your team?
These are some of the questions we often hear:
“I want to know how to use a defibrillator.” “We are a business or community group and we have a defibrillator.”
The 4 hour Basic Life Support and Defibrillator course is a great course as it deals with safe use of Automated External Defibrillators.
The Emergency First Aid at Work is only 2 hours longer and covers a wider range of realistic first aid solutions. The content of this course is one of the basic ‘lego bricks’ that helps to build all our first aid courses.
“I want to know how to look after my family and friends if we have an accident at home.” “We work in a lower risk workplace like an office or shop.”
The six hour Emergency First Aid at Work is a good solution. It is great for voluntary youth workers, sports coaches and families.
If you have a larger team, apprentices and young people in your workplace you might want to consider the First Aid at Work. This course covers some of the medical and more serious first aid solutions needed with more people, especially young workers who statistically are more likely to have an accident than their older colleagues.
I work in a factory transport yard, construction, builders merchants or a fish farm.”
The good news is that injuries and death in these sectors are falling. The 18 hour, 3 day First Aid at Work course is designed to provide the first aid solutions to the realistic risks in higher risk workplaces. If you look at the chart below you can see that slips, trips and falls account for nearly a third of workplace accidents reported by employers. This is dealt with in-depth in the course as are how to look after a person with a head injury, seizures and diabetes. For our Fish Farm Industry the First Aid at Work also covers drowning.
Chart showing decrease in work place injuries
Types of injuries reported by employers
3 days every 3 years can seem like a big chunk of time, so if your current First Aid at Work certificate is less than 3 years old the 2 day Re-validation for First Aid at Work can be an economical and cheaper solution than the full 3 days.
This course is made up of the basic ‘lego bricks’ with some added to cover the more in-depth first aid skills needed.
“I work on Forestry Commission Land”
You will probably be aware that the Forestry Commission insist that anyone contracting or working on their land has a minimum level of first aid. The exact level of first aid depends on the risk of that particular role. This Forestry Commision document will tell you more.
We can add the +F Forestry Commission ‘lego brick’ to any of our courses to suit them to your work first aid needs.
Does your risk assessment show your specific forestry work to be low risk? Then Emergency First Aid at Work 6 hours with the +F 2 hour module added gives you the Forestry Emergency First Aid +F 8 hour course.
If the risk assessment shows your forestry workplace to be higher risk then the First Aid at Work with the +F module added gives you the Forestry First Aid at Work +F. The good news is that some parts of the +F module are already in the First Aid at Work ‘lego bricks’ so some time is saved.
It might be that you work on more remote Forestry Commission sites, or you are a deer stalker, so more than 30 minutes away from immediate help. In this case the +F ‘lego brick’ can be added to create the Forestry Outdoor First Aid +F 1 day or the Forestry Outdoor First Aid +F 2 day courses, giving you the skills you need to look after a casualty while help arrives.
If you ‘play’ in the Highlands away from the road and easy help our 1 day Outdoor First Aid or 2 day Outdoor First Aid is designed for climber, stalkers, kayaker, MTB bikers, off roaders and trials bikes.
For the outdoor professional the 2 day Outdoor First Aid covers all NGBA requirements and the Professional Outdoor First Aid course will take you from being a competent first aider to a skilled one, using the standard contents of an outdoor first aid kit.
If you are still not sure contact us and we can help!
