Cardiff and Directions
I was up early this morning! Was due to provide First Aid cover at another national festival in Cardiff for 8am, but because I was in work this afternoon I only stayed until 12pm but it wasn’t a boring morning in the slightest! Never is, to be honest, because even if we don’t get any casualties the company is good.
I misjudged the traffic and left a bit later than I should have and got stuck in the traffic in the city centre and I ended up being 15 minutes late. I didn’t have time to do anything this morning, except the essencials such as getting dressed, washing, brushing teeth and going to papershop etc. While I was there I got the only cereal bar they had and was chomping at it as I drove. When I got to our base I was greeted with toast and coffee – perfect!!
We had a bit of a natter before being paired up and being sent out into the crowds. The organisers of the event could not have pushed us more to the back of the festival if they tried. There were no sign posts, except for a really small red cross first aid symbol on the map, which very little people had. So as we were walking about people were approaching us so it’s good we were out and about. Small things here and there, nothing major except a young girl who kept vomiting but my colleague and I didn’t deal with them, another two did.
While we were walking around we went into one of the many buildings, just to look around at the art work and the music etc that was happening that day. We heard a huge bump and turned around and saw a womans legs hanging out from behind a chair. We walked over to see if she was ok but she fell and banged her head against a glass wall. Went down with quite a wallop. Her head was hurting slightly but it was her neck which was giving her problems. After asking the general questions about consciousness, concussion and spinal injuries nothing was apparent but to stay on the safe side we tried to support her head but she wouldn’t have it, we offered her oxygen but she refused, offered a chair to take her to the first aid post to give her a good checking over and do paperwork etc (it was a very busy place and most of our kit is at base) but she didn’t want that either. Need to be careful with neck pain, especially after the whack she had. I think she was embarrassed, because she worked there, people trying to fuss over her but she just wanted to get on with the job but in the end we convinced her to come back to base with us, it was only a short walk anyway.
She laid down on the bed for a short time while we did some obs and checks, refused any further treatment (her neck was still hurting) so we gave her a head injury card to take with her and told her if she feels worse or doesn’t get any better or any other symptoms start to either call for us or if she’s at home, see a doctor or go to A&E. She was very appreciative of our care and help but unfortunately there’s only so much we can do. If she refuses treatment she refuses but we did the best we could.
Back out on ‘the beat’ my colleague and I preformed an operation. Seriously! Well, it was serious, but not on a living person. Nor an animal, before you say! There were a lot of stores etc around the place, offering different activities, freebies, lectures/talks, food etc and one of the stores was about a medical school. They had a plastic body and put the game ‘operation’ on top and we had to get the ‘organs’ out of him! When we did it we were given a free stress ball shaped like a doctor. It’s so cool!
So yeah anyway the morning was interesting, took me ages to get home because I tried to be smart. I thought I wouldn’t need the sat nav, only got to follow signs for the M4 – how hard can it be?? Well I did just that, and ended up driving towards Barry. I thought this wasn’t right, turned on the sat nav, “take the next exit… !!!” Ended up putting 15 minutes on my journey! Felt like it took forever to get out of Cardiff.