Only female bees and wasps sting

Just another gloomy summer day in London and sitting in the garden with a friend,sipping good old english tea - menondade on a hot sunny day would have been preferred - we suddenly get visited by a bee.  "not seen many of these this summer," says my friend and hardly had she got the words out of her month when she gets stung!!! 

The poor bee had landed on her hand for a wee rest and she, not knowing it was there was describing an event to me and slapped her hand on the table - with the bee underneath.

And it was painful and there sitting in the middle of her hand was the Bee sting.  "Do you think the bee will die now," she ask worried. More important was to get the sting out immediately. "tweezers," she shouts. Putting on my Safe and sound hat, and remembering what our paramedics always teach on our first aid courses,  I explain, tweezer should never be used. You don't want to snap the sting or push it further in - I grab a credit card and gently edge the sting  off her hand.  I check her out for any signs of swelling or anaphylactic shock but all is good. Once the sting is removed it is important to use a cold compress or cold water to reduce the swelling.

Some people can have a severe allergic reaction to being bitten or stung and the whole body can react within minutes which can lead to anaphylactic shock. Anaphylactic shock is very serious and can be fatal.

So do bees really  die after they have stung you?  I search for answers.  Apparently it depends on which kind of bee stung you.  Honey bees do die after they sting but other bees and of course those horrible wasps, don't.  and another interesting fact I found out is that only female bees  and wasps sting.  Venom, pumped from attached venom sacs, is injected into the unfortunate victim through the stylus, the needle-like portion of the sting apparatus. The stylus is enclosed between a pair of lancets. When a    bees or wasp  stings you, the lancets become embedded in your skin. They alternately pull the stylus into your flesh, and then the venom sacs pump venom into your body.

My friend is fine and hopefully so is the bee.

WHAT TO DO  - First Aid for bites and Stings

Bee, wasp and Hornet stings cause localised pain and swelling but are not usually serious.

•        If the sting is still visible in the wound, carefully scrape it away with your fingernail or  a card such as a credit card ad ensure that the poison stored in the poison sac attached to the sting is not     squeezed into the bloodstream.

 

•        Place a cold compress on the area stung to relieve pain and reduce swelling and if possible raise the affected area.

•        If the sting is in the mouth, remove if possible and get the child to sip cool water or suck on a piece of ice.

•        TAKE THE CHILD TO HOSPITAL OR DIAL 999 IMMEDIATLEY IF THE LIPS, TONGUE OR THROAT BEGIN TO SWELL

Choking Baby - know what to do

On yesterdays  Safe and Sound  Paediatric First Aid Course for new parents the two questions that most parents asked us were: what to do if my baby starts choking? and what to do if he stops breathing?  This is not uncommon - we are alway getting asked this questions.  And of course parents are anxious and are always going to be worried about this.

Lucikly the latter -- stopping breathing is rare - but you do need to know what to do and we cover this very very thoroughly on all  Safe and Sound first aid  courses.  The former, choking, is not rare and will happen many times, most times it will pass without an issue - that said you still do need to know what to do.

Most important in both of these scenarios is keeping clam. A baby or child who is choking is going to be anxious and scared as they won't understand what is happening and the more they panic the worse it will become.   Your job, however upset and scared you are, is to remain calm. Your anxiety will transfer to the baby or child.  I know, not easy and this is where the correct training comes in. Because if you know what to do at least you can do something about it.

So below are some instructions:

If a baby is choking, you need to assess the situation quickly to see how best you can help.

 

 

This information applies to babies aged under one year old. For information relating to adults and older children, see

 

What should I do if someone is choking?

 

Choking happens when a person’s airway suddenly gets blocked so they cannot breathe. Their airway can be partly or fully blocked. In babies, choking is often caused if they put small objects in their mouths, which then get stuck. It can also be caused by food getting stuck.

Choking in babies under one year old

A baby who is choking will be distressed and may be unable to cry, cough or breathe.

• Lie the baby face down along your forearm or thigh, with their head low. Support their head.
• Give up to five firm slaps to the baby’s back between the shoulder blades with the heel of your hand. (The heel is between the palm of your hand and your wrist.)
• Stop after each slap to check if the blockage has cleared. Look inside the baby’s mouth and remove any obvious blockage. Do not poke your fingers into the baby’s mouth unless you can see and reach the blockage. You may push it further in.
• If the airway is still blocked, give up to five chest thrusts (see below).
• Stop after each thrust to check if the blockage has cleared.

If the baby’s airway is still blocked after three cycles of back slaps and chest thrusts, you should:.

• dial 999 (or 112) for an ambulance immediately. Do not leave the baby. Take him or her with you to the phone 
• continue with the cycles of back slaps and chest thrusts until help arrives

Chest thrusts for babies under one year old

In babies under one year old, chest thrusts are used in an emergency to clear a blockage from their airway. Important: do not use abdominal thrusts with babies under one year old.

• Lie the baby along your forearm on their back, with their head low. Support their back and head.
• Give up to five chest thrusts. Using two fingers, push inwards and upwards (towards the head) against the baby’s breastbone, one finger's breadth below the nipple line.
• Check if the blockage has cleared after each thrust, by looking inside the baby’s mouth and removing any obvious blockage. Do not poke your fingers into the baby’s mouth unless you can see and reach the blockage as you may push it further in. 

Complications

Once the baby’s airway is cleared, some of the material that caused the blockage can sometimes remain and cause complications later. If the baby still has a persistent cough or difficulty swallowing, they need to see a health professional urgently. You should take the baby to A&E, an NHS Walk-in Centre or your GP if it’s during GP hours.

 

For more inforamtion about paediatric first aid courses go to :

http://www.safeandsound.uk.net/catalogue_main.php?catID=4428

 

Heart Attacks

I have a new question that I pose to everybody I meet. "Would you know what to do if I had a heart attack?"  The scary thing is that almost everybody has either said 'no' or given me the wrong answers. The most common response is ”I would put you in the recovery position" which is not correct.    

This doesn't make me feel very comfortable, especially as last year I was rushed to hospital with a suspected heart attack. How reassuring it would be to know that if I did collapse in the street, started choking or stopped breathing somebody near to me would know what to do. Now you might well say 'well she would say that wouldn’t she because she runs Safe and Sound which is a First Aid Training Company. '  But it isn't just about getting more business - it has to be the most important skill that we will ever learn. Why wouldn't we want to learn first aid? 

For some reasons we Brits are really bad at this and I am not sure why. Maybe because it is scary and easier to hope that it will just never happen.  But it happened to Heather who was only 48.

Last year she, a receptionist at Highgate Dental Practice in London had a heart attack just after she arrived at work in the morning. She was fit and healthy and only 48.  Her heart stopped three times and she was in a coma for four days. She survived because the surgery, had she finished their training with us and it was fresh in their minds. Everyone  knew exactly what to do. It is these crucial moments before the ambulance arrives that are so important and it stopped heather from suffering brain damage or dying.

“Had we not had the training, we would have been at a loss,” Dr Hagan explained. “At the early stages, the most important thing is to keep the oxygen circulating around the body. We all worked like clockwork."

 

Here are some interesting heart attack facts.

Overall cardiac arrest survival rate

259 out of 3,246 cardiac arrest patients who ambulance staff attempted to resuscitate survived to be discharged from hospital (8%).

In 2009/10, 237 out of 2,973 cardiac arrest patients treated by ambulances staff survived (also around 8%).

 Around two thirds of cardiac arrests in London occurred in the home (67.7%)

·         Just over a fifth of cardiac arrests occurred in public (20.8%)

·         Between a third and a half of all cardiac arrests were witnessed by bystanders (44.1%)

·         However, bystanders only gave cardio-pulmonary resuscitation (CPR) in just over a third of all cardiac arrests (36.7%)

·         The average age of a cardiac arrest patient was 68

·         The majority of patients (64%) were male

·         Female patients were on average six years older than males (72 compared with 66)

·         Cardiac arrests occurred most frequently on a Monday

·         The highest number in a single month occurred in December (10.8%) and the fewest in July (6.9%)

Chain of survival and defibrillation

For every minute that a person in cardiac arrest must wait to be defibrillated, their chance of survival decreases by approx 10%.  If a cardiac arrest happens in the home and there is no defibrillator it is important that good quality CPR is carried out to keep the brain oxygenated and the heart pumping.

 It is not rocket science so common guys do yourself a favour and make sure you are prepared.

 

Drinking Enough Water

Just a reminder about the importance of drinking lots of water in this wonderful hot weather which hopefully will stay with us for a while.  It is  very easy to become dehydrated and if you wait to drink water when you feel thirsty you are probably already dehydrated.

A good general recommendation is to drink enough fluid so that you're not thirsty for long periods of time, and to steadily increase your intake during exercise or hot weather.

Some of the early warning signs that you're dehydrated include:

•feeling thirsty and light headed
•having dark coloured, strong-smelling urine
•passing urine less often than usual

A baby may be dehydrated if they have:

•a sunken soft spot (fontanelle) on their head
•few or no tears when they cry
•fewer wet nappies
•drowsiness

The body is affected even when you lose a small amount of fluid. Read more about the symptoms of dehydration www.nhs.uk

 

Save a Mate - first aid for teenagers

The appalling events of last Wednesday have once more brought to our attention the danger that sadly surrounds us - not in Afghanistan or Iraq but on our streets.

As the mother of three young male adults I have been aware for many years of street violence, not in the same vein as last Wednesday - but there all the same.  All three of my sons have been mugged not once but several times and one of my sons had stitches because of a stabbing.

Our children are and have adapted to this way of life. They are well aware of the situation, more so than us, and many of them, especially at night, plan their routes accordingly. Some of my boys' friends told me about their coping strategies. "I have two phones, so I can give them a phone that doesn't have my sum card with all my numbers on it," said one. Another said: "I never use white headphones as they are a dead giveaway that you have an iPod." A third volunteered: "I always keep smaller change in my pocket and I hide my wallet." Interestingly, I remember doing that in New York back in the '70s.
Is it inevitable that our children will be attacked?  I think for boys in London it is almost a right of passage

As a parent, our first reaction is to wrap our kids in cotton wool and never let them out of the house. But clearly this is not practical. So we move into mentor mode, and begin to discuss prevention with them. We talk about street crime, what to do to avoid it, what to do if approached, how to react with intelligence rather than with hormones or emotion, the "no-brainer" of choosing to give up your phone, iPod, wallet - anything rather than your life. In the event, my kids seem to be better versed and more rational than we could have possibly imagined. But then they have thought about it, talked about it, rehearsed it. We haven't.

But if we cannot really help them with prevention, what can we do? How can we provide real, useful help?
The fact is that most teenagers do not have a clue as to what to do if someone they are with suffers a serious injury. So if we cannot help them prevent an attack, at least we can help them limit the consequences.

Many years ago, when, my youngest was just an infant, he suffered from febrile convulsions. Neither my husband nor I knew what to do. We had no training, no information and no experience. Though our child grew out of the condition without any ill effects, one of the changes for me was to take a first-aid course.

And now I organise through my company Safe and Sound Save a Mate Training Courses.  We fully back the British Heart Foundation’s quest to ensure that all children leave school with basic first aid skills.  It has to be one of the most important skills that we can ensure that our children learn.   When one of my sons was at The Reading Rock Festival a few years ago and his mate passed out because he had taken a drug which had a bad effect on him, my son knew exactly what to do - but he was the only one who did know.

In an emergency we all need to react quickly and effectively because knowing what to do can make the difference between life and death.

Holiday Pool Drowning Accidents

I know my last blog was about secondary drowning and water safety water but the tragic news that 5 year old Chloe Johnson drowned in a hotel swimming pool in Sharm-el-Sheik has highlighted just how dangerous water can be for young children. We are coming into holiday season now and we all need to be extra vigilant with children and water. 

Each year millions of Brits go abroad for their summer holidays and stay in hotels or Villas. Swimming is one of the main activities but not all pools are that safe. More than half of the victims of drowning on holidays are under 4 years old.

  As a parent we  need to be extra vigilant with our  children. Many hotels do not have lifeguards on duty and those that do tend to see their role more of handing out beach towels than constant pool safety supervision. Do not leave young children to be supervised by other slightly older children. I have a very good friend, who when she was 9 years old her mother left her with her brother who was 5. He drowned and although the mother never blamed my friend I think it is something she has carried with her all her life.

When my three children were all under 7 we holidayed in a hotel in Spain.  Albeit this was a long time ago but I was appalled by the state of the swimming pool. I complained to the tour operator  both when we were there and when we returned.  Not only was it unsafe with no shallow end despite it being a children's holiday destination, there was no lifeguard supervision and it was also filthy!

At home if we take our children to the local swimming pool and   somehow we instinctively know that we must watch them at all times but when we go on holiday I think that perhaps we get into holiday mode and are a bit more carefree.  Holiday pool drowning  apparently tend to happen most on the first and last day of  a holiday because  parents may be less vigilant because of distractions surrounding arrival at the holiday destination and packing up to go home. Children  are excited and keen to explore and may easily slip away.

This also goes for Villas with pools.  You need to ensure that when you hire your Villa that there is a fence around the pool and there is a shallow end for young children with easy access. I have stayed in Villas before where the pool is completely unsuitable for young children and wish I had asked more questions before I booked. 

Should you ever have to deal with a drowning it is incredibly important that you start CPR immediately (for  CPR training  go to www.safeandsound.uk.net) and do not stop until help arrives - as I pointed out in my last posting you can keep a young child or baby alive for much longer than an adult by giving CPR. You only stop when help arrives or you are too exhausted to carry on.

Below is some information I hope you find of interest from RoSPA.

Key facts are supplied by Rospa

Toddlers (0 - 3 years) - Two to three years are most at risk. In many cases the toddler wandered away from parents and fell into an unsupervised pool.

Young children (4-5 years) – Some drownings happened after the child was last seen playing in the water, or playing near to water. In many cases parents were unaware of the problem until the child was found in the water (most commonly a hotel swimming pool).

Older children (6-9 years) - In all of these cases the children were swimming.

Parental supervision - Drowning children don’t cry out for help and wave to be rescued - they disappear under the surface – often unseen and unheard. Adults need to be vigilant whenever a child is in or near a pool.

Lifeguards - Many hotel pools will not have lifeguards on duty. Of those that do have lifeguards – their roles are often combined with other duties. Many pools will have ‘pool attendants’ who give out towels and make sure the site is clean. Their main response is usually after the event has happened as opposed to the UK where a lifeguard’s main role is focused to prevent incidents occurring before the event.

Holiday villas - If you book a private property – you will have to be the lifeguard. A number of holiday pool drownings have occurred in villas during the evening (or early morning) where the child has gone outside without their parent’s knowledge and ended up in the pool. It is impossible to be awake and supervise all the time. Check to see if your villa has safety barriers (permanent or otherwise) that will stop young children from getting into the pool without your help.

Key points for parents to consider

Before you go:

· Check the safety arrangements in advance

· Teach children never to swim alone

· Be cautious about booking villas that do not have safety fencing

· Take a first aid course – know how to resuscitate a child

· Ask your travel company if the hotel pool has a lifeguard

When you are there:

· Actively supervise all young children near water

· Choose pools that are fenced with locking gates

· Even if a pool has a lifeguard – know where your children are, and what they are doing in the water

· Let children take swimming classes whilst on holiday – they are a great way of gaining water confidence and learning essential water safety skills

· Inflatables are not a substitute for supervision or swimming ability

Rules for children:

· Water safety rules for children

· Never swim alone

· Do not dive into unknown depths of water, and only jump feet first into water

· Do not push or jump onto others

· Know where to get help in an emergency

Dry Drowning - Safety in or around water

I have to confess that  until a few years ago I was quite ignorant about dry drowning.  It is not something that come across very often.  It came to my attention when I read a story in the newspaper about a  10-year-old boy who died several hours after being in a swimming pool and the newspaper report had said that he had died from dry drowning. Hmm I thought - time to find out a bit more about this. 

And it is definately high on our first aid teaching agenda - it is so important.   www.safeandsound.uk.net

Your baby, child, or even an adult has a near drowning incident but recovers quickly and you think everything is ok so you don't get them checked out - the result can be disasterous  and in some cases fatal like the poor youngster in the news story.  

 So what  is dry drowning?

Dry drowning or secondary drowning is basically drowning without water. With dry drowning you are not drowning from an immediate immersion in water; it is more of a delayed effect of a small amount of water in the lungs.

This can trigger a reaction in the lungs which can be fatal, even 24hrs after the initial incident!

Why is this?

If enough water is inhaled then it can wash away the chemical (surfactant) which keeps part of the lungs (alveoli) open. Without this surfactant the lungs begin to collapse. Then the body’s fluids as well as those swallowed/inhaled may seep into the lungs. This prevents oxygen and carbon dioxide from being exchanged and effectively cause the patient to drown (asphyxiate). This can occur much later than the initial incident and without any more fluid being inhaled.

The symptoms include:

Lethargy

Difficulty in breathing

Pain when breathing (especially when taking deep breaths)

Coughing

Possible wheezing

Symptoms are sometimes exacerbated when lying flat.

In young children, submersion in cold water (10 degrees C) can stimulate a reaction known as the 'Mammalian Diving Reflex'. This causes the child  to enter into a similar state to hibernation whereby the body slows its breathing and heart rate. This is good news as it can increase a child’s chances of survival.

One of our trainers who is also an A & E nurse recalls a situation when she was involved in the resuscitation of a toddler who had drowned in the family pond.   The accident happened in February on a cold but sunny winter morning.  The two older children of the family went out to play in the garden but didn't realise the toddler had followed them.  After approximately 20 minutes, dad spotted the toddler face down in the pond.  He retrieved him and started CPR, as luckily he had been trained.  An ambulance was called and when it arrived the paramedics started more advanced life support and brought him to the emergency department.  On his arrival this little boy was significantly hypothermic and was resuscitated for almost an hour before his heart spontaneously re-started.  The child made a full recovery.

You may just want to jump on in to rescue somebody but It is important to remember that you should only enter the water if you are sure you will not become a casualty yourself.