Thoughts after reading the open class on children’s safety and first aid

First, the vast majority of accidental injuries to children can be avoided in advance, and first aid is the last resort.； Second, if you encounter a problem, don’t act blindly or dare to move. It is far more reliable to clearly distinguish the boundaries of the scene and then deal with it accordingly than to blindly copy the “first aid tips” on the Internet.

Don't tell me, the nurse Li who gave the lecture that day has been in the pediatric emergency room for 8 years. I had cold sweats on my back after watching the several case videos shown. The 2-year-old boy who was just born last month swallowed a button battery. The parents thought it was a small button and waited for the baby to pass it out on his own. It took 12 hours for the baby to cry and complain that his throat hurt before he was sent to the hospital. The esophagus had been burned through by the battery leakage. He had been treated for almost half a year and still had not recovered. I used to think that my baby was sensible and would not put things into his mouth randomly. The first thing I did when I got home that day, I put all the buttons, batteries, and thumbtacks scattered in the drawer into a lockable storage box. Even the nut plate that was previously placed on the coffee table was moved to a higher place - really, when the baby's curiosity rises, he can get into trouble that you can't even imagine in 10 seconds. How can there be any "absolutely obedient" child.

When it comes to easy-to-trap operations, the Heimlich maneuver is definitely the most widely spread and most misunderstood one. I had seen many teaching videos on Douyin before, all of which were about holding the baby and punching the belly from behind. I learned in class that day that babies under 1 year old cannot do this at all. They have to turn over and lie on the legs, pat the back and press the chest, and the intensity must be controlled. Previously, a parent used the adult version of Heimlich on a 10-month-old baby with strangulation, which directly broke the baby's ribs and almost caused more serious internal injuries. There are also many people who reach out to pick out something when they see something stuck in their baby. Nurse Li specifically emphasized that unless you can clearly see the foreign object stuck in the throat and can take it out with a single pull, you must not pick blindly. The more you pick at the foreign object, the deeper it will fall into the airway. What could have been taken out ends up being blocked.

The treatment of burns and scalds is the hardest hit area by folk misunderstandings. This class also mentioned the treatment standards that have not yet been fully unified in the industry. My mother always said that you should apply toothpaste and soy sauce when you have a burn, which can relieve pain and leave no scars. Now the mainstream clinical guidelines clearly state that small-area mild burns and scalds (only red marks, no broken skin) should be washed with running cold water for 15 to 20 minutes. Colored things must not be applied, as it will interfere with the doctor's judgment of the injury. However, some doctors from the burn and scald department have pointed out that if it is a deep burn or scald that has broken the skin over a large area, direct showering with cold water can easily lead to infection and hypothermia. In this case, do not rinse the wound with clean sterile gauze and gently cover the wound with a clean sterile gauze and send it to the doctor immediately. In fact, both statements are reasonable. The key is to determine the severity of the injury first. It is absolutely correct to use ordinary boiling water to splash on the hand and it will burn red. If the whole hand is peeled off and blistered, don't deal with it by yourself. The correct solution is to run to the hospital quickly.

There has also been a lot of quarrels in the mother's group about the treatment of children with convulsions. Up to now, many people still say that they should put a spoon in the mouth quickly to prevent biting the tongue or pinching the child until the baby wakes up. That day, Nurse Li said that the latest evidence-based medicine guidelines had already eliminated these operations. Stuffing things could easily cause choking or tooth damage. Pinch the child's throat was useless at all to stop convulsions. If you really encounter a baby having a convulsion, you just need to lay the baby on its side on a flat place, move the surrounding hard objects away to avoid bumps, and send the baby to the doctor as soon as possible after the extraction. Of course, there are also many veteran doctors at the grassroots level and parents of the older generation who are still using their previous experience. At this time, I don’t think there is any need to argue about who is right and who is wrong. It is always right to give priority to the latest authoritative clinical guidelines.

At the end of the class that day, a grandma asked, saying that her child was scratched by the cat at home and had a red mark. If there was no bleeding, did she not need to get a rabies vaccine? Nurse Li said that as long as there is a red mark, it is considered a second-level exposure, and in principle, it should be vaccinated. If it is a domestic cat that has been fully vaccinated, it can be vaccinated and observed for 10 days. If the cat does not die within 10 days, the next injection does not need to be vaccinated. However, if the cat is caught by a stray cat, no matter what the situation, it must be vaccinated as soon as possible. Don't leave it to chance.

I always thought that these kinds of open classes were just a formality, but after listening to them, I realized that learning these things is not just to wait for an emergency to happen, but to know where there are risks after learning, and to prevent unnecessary harm to the baby in advance. If something really happened, you wouldn't be so panicked that your hands and feet would be trembling and you would rub alcohol on your baby's broken forehead. Oh yes, that day I also corrected a misunderstanding I had had for several years: broken skin wounds and mucous membranes should never be disinfected with alcohol. It is too irritating, so use iodophor.

Now all the socket protective covers in my house have been replaced with new ones, the hot water bottle is always placed on the inside of the countertop out of reach of the children, and a protective net is added to the gap between the anti-theft nets on the balcony. To be honest, I really hope that the first aid knowledge I have learned in this life will never be used once.