Translated material
Not with just a bandage
From July 1, motorists will have to change first-aid kits
The government is not giving up attempts to make the lives of Russian motorists on the road safer, and at the same time make the work of doctors easier, who sometimes cannot quickly provide assistance to people involved in road accidents due to the inept actions of sympathetic “fellow drivers.” From July 1, the composition of car first-aid kits will be changed: now drivers will not have to constantly carry iodine, brilliant green, analgin and other medications with them. Instead, they will need to increase the number of bandages and adhesive plasters, Olga Krivonos, director of the department of organization and development of healthcare at the Ministry of Health and Social Development of the Russian Federation, said yesterday.“The supply of first aid kits has increased in terms of dressings, disposable napkins and other materials that are needed to maintain the vital functioning of the body,” Ms. Krivonos said yesterday at a specially convened press conference. According to her, changes to the first-aid kits are being made taking into account the current situation on the roads and the practice of providing medical care to people involved in road accidents. The official emphasizes that Russian motorists are mostly ignorant from a medical point of view and often interfere with the work of professionals with their inept first aid actions. For example, by pouring iodine or brilliant green into the wound of a person injured in an accident, they do not allow doctors to assess the size of the injury on the spot, forcing them to “wash away the brown spots” and seriously reducing the efficiency and effectiveness of the actions of the medical staff, says Olga Krivonos. In addition, now, according to her information, drivers and passengers in accidents die primarily from blood loss, so increasing the number of bandages, according to the Ministry of Health and Social Development, can help reduce mortality on the roads.
New first aid kits, according to Ms. Krivonos, are already on sale and cost an average of 130 rubles. In addition to additional bandages and plasters, the motorist's kit must include a gasket for artificial respiration, scissors and medical gloves. The chief specialist of the Ministry of Health and Social Development of the Russian Federation for emergency medical care, Sergei Bogatenko, in turn, said that “old-style first aid kits will gradually go out of use by December 31, 2011.” At the same time, Mr. Bogatenko assured that the changes initiated by the Ministry of Health and Social Development have been agreed upon with the traffic police, and traffic police officers will not fine after July 1 those motorists who will continue to use the old type of first-aid kits.
However, the Ministry of Health and Social Development does not want to dwell on technical changes. Health officials are seriously concerned about the dangerous decline in health literacy among motorists. Due to the usual reluctance to go through the long process of learning to drive or a frivolous attitude towards those lessons that relate to learning first aid skills, Russian motorists are simply not able to adequately respond to an emergency situation on the road. As Olga Krivonos reported, the Ministry of Health and Social Development will combat ignorance by improving the qualifications of driving school teachers, for which special training classes have already been created in the regions.
According to the head of the Russian Motorists Movement, Viktor Pokhmelkin, it is on increasing the medical literacy of motorists that emphasis should be placed to reduce tragic consequences on the roads. “The question is not what the composition of the first aid kit is, but whether a person can use it competently,” Mr. Pokhmelkin noted in a conversation with a Vremya Novostei correspondent. The expert does not understand the arguments of officials from the Ministry of Health and Social Development, who claim that for safer driving it is better to have more bandages than iodine and brilliant green. “People still don’t know how to use these bandages, and they can carry brilliant green and iodine with them anyway,” says the head of the Russian Motorists Movement. The idea of improving the medical qualifications of driving school employees seems sensible to Viktor Pokhmelkin, but, according to him, “it is not clear what to do with the millions of motorists who passed their licenses in previous years.” “For this overwhelming majority of motorists, it is necessary to create a state program to improve medical literacy, which could be expressed in special programs on television or the creation of free medical courses,” suggested Mr. Pokhmelkin.