The local chapter of the American Red Cross has this babysitter boot camp. It’s a two-day course that teaches not just stuff about babysitting (and certifies you in that), but there are aspects of how to run a business. While that’s good, the “boot camp” adds CPR and First Aid certification. It was an opportunity that knocked, and I enrolled Oldest and Daugther in it.
Daughter wanted to be there. Oldest was made to go. I want Oldest to take the course because no only do I think it will help his gift in working with small children, but First Aid and CPR certified? To me, that’s worth it.
I think about the notion of CPR and the notion of First Aid. Why do we encourage people to learn these skills? Here’s what Citizen CPR of Tulsa, OK says on their website:
Why Learn CPR?
Cardiovascular disease is very common — it’s the #1 killer in US and in Oklahoma.
Heart attacks can happen suddenly, especially if you and your family have one or more risk factors (family history, overweight, poor diet, smoking, etc).
Most medical emergencies occur in a person’s home or other place of recreation.
You can’t count on medical personnel to be nearby when you have an emergency, because chances are greater for sudden cardiac arrest to occur at home. If your family and friends don’t know CPR, life can be lost in mere minutes while waiting for help to arrive.
The reasons for learning CPR and first aid are simple: because when a situation that requires those skills happens, the fastest person to respond is the person right there when it happens. In a case like CPR of course it has to be someone else. For first aid, the situation may be something you can perform on yourself and certainly no one can be closer to you than you nor respond faster to you than you.
So we seem to grant and acknowledge that life-saving skills are important to know. That the more people we have on our streets with those skills, the better it is for society in general. Just ask Howard Snitzer.
With that in mind, let’s do a little word substitution. Same sort of importance about life-saving skills, just a different skill:
Violent crime can happen suddenly.
You can’t count on law enforcement personnel to be nearby when you have an emergency, because chances are greater for sudden violent crime to occur anywhere. If your family and friends don’t know how to defend themselves, life can be lost in mere minutes while waiting for help to arrive.
If we believe it’s important to know how to save lives, why are there people who say saving lives with CPR is permissible but saving lives by carrying a firearm is not?
Stuff From Hsoi 
Some of the guys at my shooting club want to learn defensive medicine – gunshot first-aid – but given the advancing age of many club-members, and starting to feel old myself at 50+ I’m more worried about defibrillators and the like…
Yeah, that’s a growing trend now.
Last time I had any formal first aid training was in Boy Scouts, but I still remember a good portion of it. I’m thinking about taking some Red Cross first aid stuff, including their backwoods/wilderness stuff. Take as much stuff through them as I can, then build these more specialized “gunshot trauma” things into the mix.
All a matter of finding time….
I applaud you for enrolling your kids in CPR classes. With most incidences requiring CPR occurring in the home, its important that not only adults, but kids also know how to perform CPR and provide first aid during emergencies. Every minute that ticks off the clock before CPR is started lessens the chance for survival. We always teach that the only wrong way of doing CPR is not doing it at all. Any effort has the potential to save a life.