Essay on the relationship between first aid and emergency health

First aid is not an end link in the emergency health system that is only used for emergency response, but a core support module that runs through the entire process of risk prevention, on-site treatment, and prognosis and recovery. The two are mutually embedded and symbiotic and inseparable. The popularity of first aid capabilities directly determines the efficiency of the emergency health system, and the construction of the emergency health system provides the underlying guarantee for the standardized development of first aid.

When I was doing first aid education in the community last month, I met an aunt carrying a vegetable basket. After listening to me explaining the key points of cardiopulmonary resuscitation, she waved her hand and said, "I'm not a doctor. Why should I learn this thing? If something really happens, just call 120 and it's over." This statement actually represents the common understanding of many people: first aid is a matter for professionals and has nothing to do with my usual "health management" of paying attention to diet and regular physical examinations, let alone emergency health.

The formation of this kind of cognition actually has traces to follow. For a long time in the past, the mainstream classification logic of traditional public health circles has indeed placed first aid in the "response" link of emergency health: emergency health is responsible for pre-risk investigation, popular science education, and post-event public health intervention. First aid is only a temporary disposal method after the incident, and it is a terminal supplement. In the 2012 version of the "National Emergency Plan for Public Health Emergencies", first aid is indeed included as a sub-item of "incident handling measures" and is completely separate from the pre-prevention module.

But the trend in academia has changed in recent years. A while ago, I read the 2024 annual review of the "Chinese Journal of Emergency Medicine", which mentioned that 87% of domestic out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (also known as sudden death) cases occur outside medical institutions. The golden rescue time is only 4-6 minutes, and the average arrival time of 120 is 15 minutes. If someone on the scene can basic CPR, the patient's survival rate can be increased by more than 300%. It is precisely based on this kind of data that new public health scholars have proposed the concept of "full chain emergency health", which directly includes the popularization of first aid skills and the configuration of home first aid kits, which originally belong to the category of "first aid", into the pre-prevention indicators of emergency health. The "Public Emergency Health Literacy Guidelines" released by the China Centers for Disease Control and Prevention last year has listed "mastering basic first aid skills" as a core literacy requirement, which is equivalent to breaking the past boundary divisions from the official level.

To be honest, I was on the side of the traditionalists before and felt that there was no need for the general public to learn overly complicated first aid operations to avoid problems caused by improper operation. Until last year, I met a kid in the second grade of junior high school who suddenly fainted when his classmates were playing ball after school. He had learned half-heartedly about CPR from his mother who was a nurse, but he didn't dare to apply pressure. So he turned the classmate's head sideways to clean up the vomit in his mouth and nose, and then squatted beside him to count his pulse. When 120 was called, the doctor said that it was thanks to him not moving the person indiscriminately and clearing the airway in time, otherwise the person might have choked. Would you say this is first aid or emergency health pre-treatment? In fact, they are inseparable at all.

There are a lot of controversies in the industry now, such as whether first aid skills should be included in compulsory courses in primary and secondary schools. The opposition is also very reasonable: children cannot control their strength well, and cardiopulmonary resuscitation can easily break ribs. Blindly moving patients with spinal injuries can cause paraplegia. It is better to teach them how to quickly dial 120 and how to identify high-risk symptoms. Supporters point to data from Shanghai: After Shanghai incorporated first aid into junior high school expansion courses, there have been seven cases of successful rescues by middle school students in two years. Even if they can only do half a set, it is better than doing nothing at all. Now some centrists have proposed a "layered first aid" solution: the general public only needs to learn the three modules of "risk identification, correct call for help, and basic treatment" and does not need to master in-depth operations. Professional operations are left to medical staff, which not only reduces rescue risks, but also improves rescue efficiency.

I sometimes make an analogy to people in the community that the relationship between first aid and emergency health is like the relationship between fire extinguishers and fire safety. You can't wait until your home is on fire before you think of finding a fire extinguisher. You need to know where to put the fire extinguisher and how to use it. You should even turn off the power when going out and check for gas leaks. These things that seem to have nothing to do with "fire extinguishing" are actually part of fire safety. In the field of health, it means: the loratadine and antihypertensive drugs you usually prepare, knowing that you should stay away from allergens when you are allergic, and that you should sit down and not run around when you feel dizzy. These are essentially the prerequisites for first aid and the core content of emergency health.

I attended an emergency health seminar in the city a while ago, and I particularly agree with what the director of the emergency department of a tertiary hospital said: “We save people in the emergency room every day, and we save people in the last step. But if everyone had first aid awareness, many people would not need to be sent to us at all. ”Nowadays, the boundary between the two is becoming increasingly blurred. Whether it is the traditional school or the new school, whether it emphasizes professional treatment or universal popularization, the ultimate goal is actually the same: to give ordinary people more initiative and less regret of being powerless in the face of sudden health risks.