If a critically ill child is in a home scene where there is a shortage of medical supplies, how should we provide first aid before the doctor arrives? The principle of first aid for critically ill children at home is to save lives first, prevent disabilities, and minimize pain.
1、 First, save your life: No matter what serious situation occurs or what the cause is, if the sick child’s breathing and heartbeat are very irregular, about to stop or just stopped, the top priority is to temporarily use human power to help the sick child breathe, in order to restore their autonomous breathing; Help him heartbeat to maintain his blood circulation.
At room temperature, if breathing and heartbeat completely stop for more than 4 minutes, life will be in jeopardy; It’s difficult to recover after more than 10 minutes. Therefore, when a sick child’s breathing and heartbeat are severely impaired, if emergency treatment is not given for a long time and only doctors come to rescue them, or they are sent to the hospital for rescue, it often leads to irreversible consequences.
Once the favorable opportunity to save a sick child is lost, even the most skilled doctors and advanced medical equipment are powerless. Therefore, during this ten minute period, immediate emergency measures such as artificial respiration and heart compression should be implemented, which are the two most important life-saving methods that parents must learn!
When rescuing critically ill children, parents should also take measures for some easily eliminated pathogenic factors. If there is severe bleeding or arterial rupture due to trauma, immediate measures should be taken to stop the bleeding; If gas poisoning occurs in winter, immediately open the doors and windows, or take the poisoned child to another room to prevent the sick child from inhaling carbon monoxide, etc.
2、 Disability prevention: While rescuing the lives of critically ill children, efforts should be made to prevent them from leaving disabilities in the future. If we mishandle during emergency treatment, some dying children may have their lives saved, but sometimes they may leave behind disabilities, causing lifelong unhappiness. When children suffer from falls and injuries, it often leads to spinal fractures. When such fractures are suspected, the child should be strictly prohibited from walking, and during transportation, wooden stretchers such as door panels must be used to transport them. However, some parents often, due to a lack of common sense or carelessness, still allow their children to walk, or use soft stretchers such as ropes and canvas to carry the sick child, or even hold the sick child with their back, resulting in spinal fractures. As the child continues to move, the spinal cord nerves are damaged, leading to lifelong paralysis.
When encountering various chemical burns that damage the eyes, esophagus, and other areas, it is necessary to rinse the site with a large amount of water in a timely manner, and never wait for the hospital to handle it again, so as not to cause serious corrosion and burns to the tissue, leading to blindness of the eyes or scar formation in the esophagus.
3、 Less pain: refers to minimizing the pain of sick children during on-site emergency treatment, as the damage caused by unexpected disasters is often severe and often causes great physical and mental pain to children. Such as various burns, fractures, severe pain, and even shock, exacerbating the condition. So, whenever possible, it is important to minimize the pain of the sick child. When moving and handling, it is important to be gentle, and the language should be gentle (some children may still have a clear mind when they are critically ill). Do not think that saving lives is important and other aspects should be ignored. Saving lives first, preventing disabilities, and minimizing pain, although there are priorities and severity, they are actually a unified and complementary overall measure. When parents encounter problems, they should calmly implement it.
