Category: First Aid/Medical

The two procedures that make up Field Dentistry are fillings and extractions. Field Dentistry is defined as providing your own dental care when there is no other way; probably due to collapse of our health care system along with the rest of our fragile economy and civilization due to the disastrous economic policies of our “leaders”, a terrorist attack, or some other reason. Fillings can be easy or complicated depending on the size of the cavity and the surfaces of the tooth that are involved.  Starting with the simplest- a one surface cavity in the chewing surface of the tooth, …

JWR, In his recent SurvivalBlog article, Don H. incorrectly stated that alcohol will not kill MRSA or Staph.  I want to set the record straight on this, as working with bacteria is my career.  Any bacteria that does not form spores will be contact-killed by a 70% Isopropanol (or other alcohol) treatment.  This includes MRSA (and other staph bacteria, as MRSA is Methycillin Resistant Staphylococcus Aureus).  The only commonly encountered bacteria that will certainly not be killed with alcohol are Clostridium species (the source of botulism [C. botulinum] and gas gangrene [C. perfringens] and Mycobacterium species [M. tuberculosis].  C. difficile is another …

Sir, I’ve found another possible non-power-using answer to CPAP. Check out this oral device to simulate the chin-lift method of opening the airway used during CPR. I have no affiliation with the above web site and I currently use CPAP. I just thought the above web site looked like an okay starting point for information and research into the subject.

If society collapses and you’re on your own, what medical skills seem the most essential?  The answer likely depends on your age, health status, and stage in life.  For those of child-bearing years, midwifery skills may be paramount.  For those advanced in age, diagnosis and treatment of chronic disease becomes primary.  For the otherwise young and healthy, treatment of injuries and infection tops the list. Our current compartmentalized society has deemed that doctors should perform these tasks, though turf wars abound over what nurses, physician assistants, pharmacist, paramedics, and others should legally be permitted to do.  Recent decades have also …

I read the article by “American Dad” titled “Prepping and Unassisted Childbirth”, and I must comment on some of his points.  As a “senior” practicing Physician, and an avid closet “Prepper” since the early 1980s, I have often considered the health consequences of a true SHTF scenario.  Only recently has my Family suddenly decided my preparations are not so “far out there” after all, but it has been a lonely quest these many years.  I long ago gave up trying to convince people to look past and through the media hype and actually “see” what is running the world view.  …

Sir: Becca makes a great deal of sense with regard to muscle recovery.  It is also my humble opinion, that massage is an essential component in physical therapy for major injuries and for those preppers, such as myself, who suffer from partial disabilities involving muscle issues that are resultant from nerve damage, neuropathy,  and other deep tissue injuries.  As an example, I have had everything from vertebra L3 down to vertebra S1 surgically fused.  While such a fusion, in and of itself, is not considered completely disabling; if you take into account the resulting damage of lesser nerves by the …

It could evolve as systems are stressed after a natural disaster.  It could be caused by a terrorist attack.  It could even be the result of a societal or economic collapse.  Have you ever thought about what might happen if our current health care system (EMS, Doctors, Hospitals, and Pharmacies) ceased to function normally? What would you do if you couldn’t go to your doctor, all of the hospitals were shut down, all of the pharmacies closed, and no one answered the phone when you called 911?  You would be on your own.  You would have to take care of …