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This month’s training involved us taking on board a couple of minor changes in how we respond to patients if we are called out. I won’t go into the technicalities but these changes are the result of ever-continuing research which shows what treatment gets the best results. So we will actually go back to how we worked a year or so ago. It’s a challenge to wipe our brains of one set of actions, especially when we don’t use our skills regularly. Rest assured, your First Responders are on the case!

Due to family commitments and hols I haven’t mentioned our small stall at Wake’s Week. We sold heart shaped shortbread and had the dummies available for people to refresh existing resuscitation skills. It was great to see how many youngsters were keen to have a go. We also demonstrated the crucial and potentially life-saving Recovery Position. I think all of our CFR group feel that however scary it might be to contemplate resuscitating someone, it’s nothing compared to the helplessness of facing a dying loved one and not knowing what to do – the “if only” scenario. As a group we are very keen to help people gain or improve life-saving skills. We have put on training in the past and if people feel the need for another short course we would love to hear from them.

It is worth mentioning that some of our Responders who are no longer available to go on the rota nevertheless join us at training to maintain their skills. This means that we have a good pool of basic knowledge within the village.

Lastly, for anyone interested in how we spend any funds raised, here are a few examples:

• the pads on the defibrillators have a shelf-life and need replacing
• training dummies
• extra defibrillators and kit bags
• travel expenses for our volunteer trainers
• hire of the village hall
• funding First Aid training sessions
• buying new items of kit as and when they are advised by EMAS

Thanks for reading and best wishes for a lovely summer form your CFR group.

Sue H