Gun owners need basic medical training

Thanks marquez for a good article. i have personally been involved in a CPR "save." It works. I think the AED is now responsible for more saves even than CPR.
 
Amazing to me how so many people think they have some right to tell me what I should do. It is still a free country and my right to self-defense comes from God, not from the Nanny State or the do-gooders telling me that as a firearm owner I "need" to learn CPR and first aid. Take your doctrinaire attitudes to the Democrat National Convention and share them with all your pals. Thankfully, my state does not throw any of those ridiculous "training" requirements at our citizens.
 
valleyforge.1777 said:
Amazing to me how so many people think they have some right to tell me what I should do. It is still a free country and my right to self-defense comes from God, not from the Nanny State or the do-gooders telling me that as a firearm owner I "need" to learn CPR and first aid. ... Thankfully, my state does not throw any of those ridiculous "training" requirements at our citizens.
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We're not discussing training requirements imposed by government. We're discussing knowledge and skills that a prudent person will voluntarily undertake to acquire. Yes, one has the right to remain ignorant. But he shouldn't expect to be congratulated if he makes that choice.

John Adams said, “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.” I think one might add "responsible."
 
Frank, I'll add this as a reply to you, and then bow out of the discussion so as not to tread into being taken as insulting, etc. Respectfully, I reject your right to determine if I am being ignorant. It IS a free country.
 
As a professor, I make many decisions that folks are ignorant.

I reject the idea that we cannot opine on actions that will help or not help others.

Would one feel insulted or a part of a political party's agenda if I stated that you should pay attention to the 4 rules of gun safety?

Jeff Cooper - the biggest nanny of the RKBA community. God gives me the right to reject his advice not to point a gun at something that I don't want to destroy, treat guns as if they are loaded (a safety mnemonic), etc.

I reject, by evoking the Deity, when the SO at a match, yells: Finger at me!

Why those two retired Marines who are my friends and typical SO's are just big nannies and insulting the Deity.
 
There's no shame in ignorance. It just means there's something you don't know.

There are a lot of things I'm completely ignorant about. These items come in three categories:

  • Things I have neither a need nor a desire to know more about. Rap music, for example; it leaves me cold, I am not interested in improving my knowledge of the genre, and I can foresee no downside to remaining ignorant on the subject.

  • Things I will one day know more about whether I want to or not. The human aging process, for example; I will either learn more about that, or I will die before I have a chance to do so.

  • Things that I really should learn more about, for my own sake. Business skills, for example; having recently started my own business, I will either learn more about this, or I will suffer for my ignorance in this area.
Medical skills for people interested in self defense fall into that last category, and that was the context in which I said I was astonished at how vigorously people protect their own ignorance. It is truly amazing that so many people would rather run the risk of suffering than suffer the risk of learning! Of course I include myself on this list. It's a very human trait, and I'm as human as anyone else.

Back to the topic at hand, here's an excellent video from the late Paul Gomez. It's been posted before, but it's worth repeating because he was absolutely on target: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6b1v9lcmG0

pax
 
Willie Lowman said:
Unless you are one of the "shoot 'em in the dark without identifying them first" group, then there is ZERO chance you will need to know first aid for gunshot wounds on loved ones.
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This level of ignorance is outright dangerous!

Under stress do you expect all of your rounds to impact on your intended target? Odds are that they won't, even if you've lit him up with light. And where are those missed rounds going? If you're in your home, will they travel through a wall and strike a loved one? If you're in public, will they hit an innocent?

Better know some basic medical aid and how to stop bleeding, maintain an airway, etc. It may save a loved one's life, or if you hit an innocent in public, it may save you the stress of having to live with killing an innocent accidentally and any potential accompanying lawsuit, which is sure to follow.
 
drew332 said:
Under stress do you expect all of your rounds to impact on your intended target? Odds are that they won't, even if you've lit him up with light. And where are those missed rounds going? If you're in your home, will they travel through a wall and strike a loved one? If you're in public, will they hit an innocent?

Better know some basic medical aid and how to stop bleeding, maintain an airway, etc. It may save a loved one's life, or if you hit an innocent in public, it may save you the stress of having to live with killing an innocent accidentally and any potential accompanying lawsuit, which is sure to follow.
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Good points. There's more, though: when you are defending yourself or your family from a deadly threat, you might not escape unscathed. Your first hint that something is wrong might be that a family member gets badly hurt by the attacker. You turned around and dealt with the attacker, but your loved one is down and bleeding.

Do you know what to do about that?

It's not all about your bullets, after all. You're using deadly force because someone else used that same level of force -- deadly, crippling force! -- against you or someone you love.

A lot of concealed carry people have never thought about that before, or always assumed they'd (of course!) always be ahead of the curve with no innocents injured or killed before they got involved. That's a serious failure of mindset, right there.

Here's a quote from a man who saved many lives on a terrible day several years back. You can hear about the event in his own words on the ProArms Podcast with Mas Ayoob here: http://proarmspodcast.com/2009/09/13/033-the-fairchild-incident-andy-brown/.

Andy Brown said: "The hardest thing [to cope with has been] that with all that mental preparation I had done, all the mental preparations of what could happen and how would I react, I'd always been the victor and shot the bad guy and he's down and nobody else is hurt. I never prepared myself for people losing their lives."

Go listen to that whole podcast. It's well worth the time it will take, and may open your eyes to some important preparation factors.

pax
 
I agree it is absolutely something everyone should have, for all walks of life. Gun owners, I believe, would definitely benefit from having BLS training. I am required to have BLS and ACLS in the O.R. I have been in the O.R. for almost 20 years now. Unfortunately, even with the best training, and being exposed to those stresses associated with saving a life, not everyone can be saved.

I think it is also important to understand that even with training, you have to accept that you do the best you can when the time comes. You have to be willing to accept the fact that it may not be enough, and move on. The hardest thing I ever faced, including my time in the Marines, was to watch a 2year old pass away as we worked as hard as we could to save her life. It took me some time, to understand that her making it to the hospital and the work the paramedics did in the field was a miracle in itself. In almost 20 years we have lost some but saved many more. The ones that you save make the next day easier. Understanding you did all you could for the others, is much harder to accept. But it is necessary in order to help the next person comimg through the door.

Like I said earlier, I believe it is important to get at least the basic training to help you prepare for those times you may be the only help available.
 
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