By: Revanche

Going another round with the what-have-you: Chapter two of accidents and aid

July 7, 2014

In the fifteen months we’ve been in office, what kind of luck have we had? Ginger?
– Toby Ziegler, The West Wing

I’m feeling a bit Toby today. It’s going to sound mean but I have PiC to thank for this post as we carry on our dance with Murphy.

Let this be a lesson to you: Get ye your first aid kits together!

He showed up at the front door bleeding profusely the other day, and I actually didn’t even notice the blood at first because I was surprised to see him at that time. Then I saw the blood.

Now I’m the klutz in the family, we all know that. I run into walls, fall off things, trip over mothballs. There’s just nothing I can’t fall over, into, or off of; it’s laughable.  But since it’s always me, I’d really slacked off on getting together our medical kit because I’ve always been able to cobble together a passable bandage with what we had on hand. In the face of his hurts, though, I had to get myself to the store and stock up on medical supplies post-haste.

Walgeen’s is running a first aid supply sale in-store and at least some things are marked down online so while patching up most of PiC multiple times, we had enough left to for the home and travel kits, all for $55.

$40 of that is FSA eligible, can anyone tell me why bandages are eligible and anti-bacterial stuff is not? They’re both OTC. Weird.

I got a free first aid bag with the purchases so that was convenient since we only had a bag for the car. Filled them both these Buy One Get One 50% off finds:

* Rolls of gauze
* Tearable cloth tape
* Tearable flexible plastic tape
* Regular bandaids for the really minor cuts in all sizes
* Gauze pads – 4″ by 4″ for maximum flexibility if we’re facing big injuries.
* Neosporin – I’m going trade our second Neosporin for the Neosporin for Kids which is a double antibiotic instead of a triple. Apparently we don’t like neomycin anymore for injuries as people are coming up allergic to it.

I also picked up a couple seriously heavy duty bandages for profuse, artery pumping, life threatening injuries for the emergency kit, tossed one of those into the car kits, the other’s for the home EQ kit.

Still Need:
* Bandage scissors for bandage removals/cutting cloth as necessary for both human and canine
* Kid’s scissors from Target when they have their back to school sales for cutting up the gauze, etc.

Still need, but pondering quantities:
* Hibiclens – As it turns out, we are also now being discouraged by medical professionals from using hydrogen peroxide to clean wounds anymore as they find it causes tissue damage. I grew up being bathed in Betadine, I don’t think that’s still in favor either, luckily for us all. @stardotgeek confirmed that she’s discovered an allergy to neomycin recently and suggested the Hibiclens.
* Tylenol/Ibuprofen – I go through this stuff so quickly it seems like the ones in the kit would be forgotten and expire; I don’t like to buy the single dose packets since we have the enormous lifetime supply bottles.

***

The Minor Injuries clinic didn’t seem to do much good, other than supplying us with antibiotics for the infection I worry he’ll get and a handful of bandaging supplies, but I’m glad we went for the medications anyway.  It’s a darn good thing very little about trauma/injuries turns my stomach because I’ve been changing his bandages three times a day and his injuries are gnarly.

Take it from me, you’ll want to pick up supplies on sale if you had to go through stacks of gauze pads and rolls everyday.

Sharing is caring!

Email

Twitter

Pinterest

0