10 Tips for First Aid at Sea.

If your position on First Aid at sea has always been to let someone else get stuck in, you might need to think again if you’re planning to be more than a couple of miles offshore. Remember that at sea, first aid knowledge could be the difference between someone you love living or dying!

Scary stuff!

Firstly, the good news is that you can get your training from a specialist, such as Red Square Medical, where all our instructors understand boats and the ocean and can tailor the course to your specific requirements. We can even teach it onboard your boat!

We do recommend a basic level of knowledge such as the RYA First Aid at Sea course to give you a good start, but it’s not essential.

There are 3 main issues when you’re trying to carry out first aid onboard any boat:

1. Lack of space.

2. A potentially unstable environment - picture bad weather and rolling seas.

3. The potentially long time period to wait for definitive care - it will take a lot longer to get help than when you’re on land and you may have to wait hours, days or in extreme cases, weeks.

So, here’s a list of 10 things that you might like to consider for first aid at sea…

1. It’s only a bump on the head!