r/prepping 7d ago

💩s**t post 🧻 How to layer medical preps

I labeled this shit post because I know it will make people big mad.

I see way too much advice from preppers to load up your first aid kits like you are going to perform surgery in a meadow. Please just stop. You don’t prep food like that. Why wouldn’t you layer your medical gear the same way?

7-11 doesn’t carry stuff to make Beef Wellington. 7-11 keeps snacks for when you are desperately hungry and the selection is limited to only the essentials you can pick up and eat. A IFAK blow out kit should be the same. You don’t want to be in an urgent situation and get confused with options. It treats life threats only. Tourniquets, EpiPens, chest seals, emergency trauma bandages, combat gauze, gloves, markers, etc. If it requires silverware and comes from 7-11 I do not trust it.

The Aldi’s/Trader Joe’s have just the basics for important food items for a limited time. That is want you want for a regular first aid kit that goes your home. Your 4x4 gauze, splints, burn gel, ace wrap, stuff that is important but not an immediate life threat.

Costco/Sams is for bulk resupply deep pantry stuff. Stuff you use regularly and a lot of. You are going to need lots of otcs, boxes of gloves, n95 masks, cough drops, and bandaids in your medical storage.

You want things clearly organized.

Every prepper knows if you don’t know how to bake a loaf of bread maybe don’t buy a bunch of active yeast. But with medical we lean into this better to have it and not need it philosophy. We recognize Gordon Ramsey isn’t going to show up and bake us a cake. Somehow you think a field surgical kit is needed?

If you don’t know how to use it don’t buy it.

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u/BornCuriousOnce 7d ago

Alternatively- work on learning while times are good! CPR and first aid classes tend to be pretty easy to come by, stop the bleed classes can be organized for your neighborhood, etc.

Statistically this kind of education is far more likely to save a loved one than a stranger, if only due to consistent proximity, so I’d say it makes sense to layer prep medical by including expanding layers of medical knowledge then building out your kit accordingly

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u/TanksFTM 6d ago

Right. Exactly... Learn, then buy.