First Aid kit on your bike?

[Pax]

...

Queen - I don't get the breathing tube thing on those masks, it looks like it'd make the patient gag cuz it looks long. Or is that just the angle of the photo? And can you use it on a child? Thanks for telling me about Galls, they've easily got the best prices on lots of stuff. (and another dumb question: if it's a one-way valve, how does the patient exhale? Do you have to let go of the mask?)

It just looks long in the pic, in reality it's only about 1.5 to 2 inches long. As far as the patient exhaling, it's not an airtight seal and the plastic has some rigidity so air escapes around the mask as soon as the mouth pressure is off.

[KnottedYet]

Thanks! I'm ordering a bunch of them.

[Melody]

With one way valve cpr masks, the patient can breathe around the mask once you let up off of it. The valve is one way to prevent any air/vomit/spray from getting into the mouth of the responder.

I do always carry a large bandana would can be useful for many things in emergencies.

Bandanas are awesome. You can use them as a triangle bandage, a sling, or to hold a split in place.

I also carry a 10" long bungie cord in my saddle bag- it can be used in a pinch to secure things onto my bike and also as a tourniquet if needed.

The one thing I caution about when using anything like a tourniquet is that if you do use a tourniquet note that you are predetermining that the limb in question is a loss and that the limb will probably be amputated.

The problem with tourniquets is that all blood supply to that limb is cut off and muscle/cells/etc begin to become oxygen starved. Not soon afterwards, cells begin to die. If you can stop the bleeding without applying a tourniquet (using extreme point pressure, for instance in the event of a femoral artery bleed) then you should do so. That said, if it's a question of losing a limb versus a life...

Mel