Just as a professional medical facility like IEP Urgent Care can keep you from an unnecessary and expensive trip to a hospital’s emergency department, a well-stocked home first aid kit is your first line of health defense and can help you quickly treat a variety of health concerns on your own.
As summer begins, and we engage in more outdoor activities that may lead to minor injuries, now is a good time to re-stock and refresh your home first aid kit. Here are some IEP Urgent Care staff suggestions and favorite at-home first aid items that you can tailor to fit your family’s size and lifestyle. To be clear, we are not being compensated in any way for these product suggestions, this is for your information only!
Have a robust all-in-one first aid kit for your home and car
Do you have an old box of band aides somewhere in the back of your bathroom cabinet, and not much else? That's not a good plan. Take a moment right now to consider and purchase a quality, multi-purpose home and car first aid kit. There are a lot of choices. Here’s what Good Housekeeping had to say about the 7 Best First Aid Kits.
Get some Tecnu
If you work in a garden, walk in the woods, or have any occasion at all to encounter Poison Ivy, Poison Oak or Poison Sumac, you need Tecnu in your home first aid kit. Poison Ivy exposure can lead to painful blisters and itching that, left untreated, can become infected. “I’ve had poison ivy many times in my life before I discovered Tecnu,” said IEP Urgent Care marketing director, Michael Isabella. “We now always have a large tube of Tecnu extreme poison ivy scrub in our home. If you’ve ever had poison ivy, you realize the moment it is starting to affect your skin. When this happens, you simply apply the Tecnu to the affected area immediately, rub it around for a bit, rinse with cold water, and the poison ivy oils are gone.” As stated on the bottle, Tecnu Extreme Poison Ivy Scrub “removes rash-causing oils in 15 seconds, helps stop oil spreading. For Poison Ivy, Oak, Sumac.”
Have BleedStop, especially when you travel
BleedStop powder is a sterile, hypoallergenic product that can stop bleeding from minor cuts to severe wounds. It is clinically proven to be effective even for people on blood thinners and is safe for direct wound application. In a recent Travel & Leisure article, many physicians urge friends and family to always travel with BleedStop, as it can literally save a life in certain situations.
Guard against ticks
In Michigan, ticks are most likely to bite you or your pet from April through July. And our milder winters and increased summer heat is leading to more tick activity in our region. If you regularly walk in wooded or semi-wooded areas, consider a lightweight covering on all exposed skin. The New York Times Wirecutter recommends two products that are applied not to your skin, but to your outerwear, as a strong repellent against ticks: Sawyer Permethrin Premium Insect Repellant or Sawyer Picaridin Insect Repellent.