Preparedness for when

elona

Mrs L

A few months won't be enough.

NewShadow

So press for a SHTF situation - up to you:

1

Something happens (you slice open your hand?) out of hours. It's not life threatening but does require treatment/stitches. Your local minor injury unit has been closed during the strike - do you treat it yourself (make do with gauze, tape and bandages) until the GP opens in the morning, go to A&E (being staffed by consultants), or something else?

2

The collapse of the NHS free at the point of care. What training do you plan on getting - from where/how, and what would you want to stock/do to minimise the ongoing cost of healthcare for you and your family?

[Deleted User]

Use steri strips and cover it up until you can get treatment or go to the pharmacy and see if they have a trained first aider.

Take a first aid course St.Johns Ambulance of Red Cross, certainly learn first response and learn to use a defibrillator having made sure you've first raised the funds necessary to provide one in your community. Some of the expedition companies actually offer a 'Field Surgery Course' which might come in jolly handy too.

greenbee

1. Go round to a neighbour... I'm surrounded by doctors and nurses, and I'd need someone else to help anyway. I try to avoid bothering them at home, but as I'm rural, most of them would prefer to be bothered than have a minor issue waste time in A&E. A GP neighbour sent me to have a tetanus when I was bitten by a dog... but agreed that I didn't need to go to A&E at 10pm - nurse next morning was fine (she called GP when she saw the bite!).

2. I can do stitches. They'd scar, but I can do them. Whether I can do them on myself is another matter entirely. I also have a tooth repair kit. But my first aid kit is appallingly bad. Again, I have neighbours with skills ...

nuatha

NewShadow wrote: »

So press for a SHTF situation - up to you:

1

Something happens (you slice open your hand?) out of hours. It's not life threatening but does require treatment/stitches. Your local minor injury unit has been closed during the strike - do you treat it yourself (make do with gauze, tape and bandages) until the GP opens in the morning, go to A&E (being staffed by consultants), or something else?

Treat it myself, if its deep enough, persuade Herself to suture it, otherwise clean it, steristrips and dressing.
Given I've been unable to get a GP appointment since January, then GP isn't likely to be an option. If if needs stiches and Herself won't or can't do it then the walk-in unit in the morning.

2

The collapse of the NHS free at the point of care. What training do you plan on getting - from where/how, and what would you want to stock/do to minimise the ongoing cost of healthcare for you and your family?

I'm already a trained first aider, though well overdue some refresher training. Considering doing the course you posted details of last week, when business picks up and there's a bit more slack in the cash flow.
We have fairly well stocked first aid kit, have 6+ months of the essential medications on hand for both of us. Private medical insurance isn't a realistic option (pre-existing conditions mean we've both been declined in the past). I have some herbal knowledge and do use several herbal preps, however the effective medications on which my continued existence depends require a functioning pharmacological industry and private access to those drugs is not currently financially viable.

thriftwizard

1... Cheating here; OH is a trainer of first-aid trainers, amongst his other skills! There are always vast quantities of bandages, steri-strips etc. lurking in corners, so I wouldn't have to resort to duck-tape. But I have been known to... and after they stapled my hip back together, I've been eying up my long-handled stapler with interest!

2... Hard one. Apart from first-aid training and rigorous cleanliness where it counts (i.e. kitchen worktops, chopping boards, sinks & handbasins, handles) good nutrition would be my first & best line of defence against the slings & arrows of outrageous fortune. Not eating junk, eating widely & making the most of what we can afford, in other words. We eat & drink a lot of ferments, in an attempt to keep doctors at bay - and also because we like the taste! - and cook as much as we practically can from scratch, as well as growing what we can in a small urban garden. So maintaining good health as far as possible would be key to life without the NHS, but also saving hard against the inevitable day when something outside our control went wrong. Some herbal training, and massage training, would also be very useful.

Cappella

Id be in a mess.
Nuatha said

the effective medications on which my continued existence depends require a functioning pharmacological industry and private access to those drugs is not currently financially viable.

Even though I'm very careful with my diet, and eat healthily; and even though my heart has recovered and seems fine my problems are genetic, and hereditory. I need the tablets I'm taking. I dont want to need them, but I'd be in a mess without them. I've got savings, and am adding small amounts to them regularly; but long term things would be difficult.

Im a registered first aider, and have just renewed my St. Johns qualification, so should be able to deal with minor injuries, dubious about bigger ones though.

New shadow - the animals Will was lovely, I'd not seen it before. It really made me stop and think hard about my own furry hot water bottle (currently curled up next to me hoping for a belly rub).

fuddle

Spin. I don't 'alf dislike it. If politicians are going to resort to statements like 'no association should be able to prevent the government from carrying out manifesto pledges. This is what the UK voted for and expect' or words to that effect, then I feel we all need to be worried.

I feel that a mentality like, and a liking for that type of spin, is a dangerous mentality that can change and manipulate anything for any gain.

When I was in the care sector I would regularly hear words of 'why should doctors get more pay, we work long hours for next to nothing and don't complain' but I firmly believe it's not a stand against pay or conditions as such, it's stand about a strategy that is sneakily being implemented to destroy the NHS as we know it. By that I mean, and this is my own opinion, that there is a want by government to have a demoralised and stressed front line NHS work force because they want to reduce the numbers so we have only a skelton staffing levels left. I fully expect that these will be the emergency staff which will leave gaps and hole in general care which will need to be privately paid for or paid for via insurance schemes.

I see little evidence of public opinion waning and I hope that it continues in support of the greater cause of the NHS as a whole. I don't believe the numbers of voters who voted this government in to power voted for a strategy like this and I do believe that modernising OUR NHS was more about a vision of investment and forward thinking than it was about stagnating investment and forcing of contracts.

One final note. Jeremy Hunt appeared smug and hiding a grin while on my TV screen last night. I urge us all to swat up on body language in a bid to look past spin and fibs.

Now I have subjected you all to my opinion I shall let you all down by saying I have little emergency skills having done a First Aid course 3 times and children's First Aid twice. Each time I go on the course what I thought I knew had changed and now I'm so confused as they all have lapsed I don't know what is right or wrong.

I shall go hunt out some teachings right now and swot up. You've left me feeling vulnerable and I don't like that. Worth your weight you lot, worth your weight!

[Deleted User]

FUDDLE anything that will deal with an emergency situation whether it's current practise or something you learned in good practise a few years ago will be appropriate to deal with injuries and accidents. It's a hard person that would stand by and watch someone choke/bleed/or die in any other way and be afraid or unwilling to use their first aid skills to deal with the situation because they were not 'up to minute' and they were afraid of being legally sued. I hope that never is the case but I suspect people help with a sense that it could!

nuatha

fuddle wrote: »

Now I have subjected you all to my opinion I shall let you all down by saying I have little emergency skills having done a First Aid course 3 times and children's First Aid twice. Each time I go on the course what I thought I knew had changed and now I'm so confused as they all have lapsed I don't know what is right or wrong.

A few years back, I did two first aid courses in a month, the first for mountain rescue the second a first aid at work - totally different, proven techniques in one that were forbidden in the other.
Some things change, some things are far more appropriate in some settings than others. Some courses have become an exercise in covering your (or your employer's) behind and not getting sued, rather than dealing with the injury.

Body language - assume a breathing politician is lying - you'll be right more often than you are wrong.