First aid for a burn: what is possible and what is not

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

How not to lose your head and act correctly, even when it hurts.

How to get burned

Burns are injuries to the skin and tissues, which most often occur due to the action of high temperature: leaning against hot water, spilling boiling water on the skin.

But a burn can be earned in other ways. Dangerous:

• Radiation. Therefore, we burn in the sun or suffer from an overdose of tanning beds.
• Chemical substances. Therefore, household chemicals should be removed to a safe place and worked with them in protective clothing: gloves, an apron and glasses.
• Friction. Therefore, you must carefully descend the tightrope.
• Electricity. Therefore, electrical injuries are so dangerous: they affect tissues with deep burns.

What to do if you get burned

Whatever the burn, you must act in the same way.

1. Stop the burn

In first aid textbooks, this is called “terminating the damaging agent”. This means that you need to get a person out from under a stream of boiling water or from an acid puddle, for example, as soon as possible. It seems obvious, but in a moment of panic, anything can happen.

If you are helping someone, make sure you are safe first. That is, make sure that you yourself do not get under the boiling water and do not get into a puddle of acid.

2. Call your doctor if needed

Be sure to call the ambulance or ambulance if:

• The injury was due to electric shock.
• Chemical burn.
• A third-degree burn or more, that is, when the skin becomes covered with blisters, when they merge into one large, when the skin in the burn area is brown or black, dry and insensitive.
• Burns of any degree more than 10% of the body surface. To roughly determine how much it is, be guided by the size of the victim's palm. One palm - approximately 1% of the body area.
• A child or a person over 70 years of age was burned.

If the burn is light, but more than five centimeters in diameter, you do not need to call an ambulance. And yet you have to get to the emergency room. And be sure to show your doctor if burns are on your face or genitals.

3. Chill the burn

Place the affected area under cool running water for about 15–20 minutes. The water should not be icy.

4. Apply a dry, clean bandage to the burn

It is best if the dressing is sterile. The size is needed so that the bandage or gauze completely covers the burn. Do not apply the bandage too tightly.

5. Give pain reliever

Any pill based on paracetamol, ibuprofen or nimesulide will help the victim.

6. Give a drink

The victim needs to drink as much as possible, because burns, even small ones, reduce the volume of circulating blood. You need to drink something warm and sweet: tea, compote.

What not to do

You should definitely not apply ointment to the affected area.

Moreover, you cannot use eggs, butter, sour cream and all other means: they will only slow down healing and interfere with doctors who will begin to treat the wound. In addition, bacteria can enter the wound with sour cream or oil.

Even if these methods have worked for ten generations of your grandmothers and great-grandmothers, don't do it. Leave the wound clean.

Can't wait to treat - treat with chlorhexidine if the burn is shallow.

Also, do not apply ice to the surface of the wound, so as not to injure it by the cold, when the skin is already damaged.

When you can do without a doctor

Minor domestic injuries can be treated on their own. Small - this is when there is only redness or a few blisters from a burn, and the affected area is not more than five centimeters in diameter.

In this case, you need to take anesthetic, drink a lot and treat the burn with a special spray with dexpanthenol. This substance helps quick healing, and in the form of a spray it is convenient to apply to painful burns.