This article has been kindly written for us Roma Felstein, a mum who runs a small company that delivers first aid and child safety courses to parents and carers of children under eight.

Would you know what to do if your child stopped breathing?

Would your childminder/nanny/au pair know what to do?

Apparently not! - A recent survey by Mother & Baby Magazine found that nine out of ten parents lack the simple first aid skills that could save their child's life. It's every parent's nightmare that their child stops breathing or starts to choke and they don't know what to do

Since starting Safe and Sound First Aid Courses I have been told many tragic stories. One mother's toddler suddenly started choking at the dinner table. The mother panicked, put her finger down the child's throat and tried to dislodge the food before calling the emergency services. By the time the ambulance arrived the child was dead. The mother's natural instinct to help remove the piece of food in fact made the situation worse. It might seem harsh but had she known the standard procedure for a choking child her toddler might still be alive today.

Anyone who has children or who takes care of children needs to understand the basics of first aid. Accidents can happen at any time and the first few minutes can be critical. You can dial 999 or drive to the hospital, but you could only have a matter of minutes, or even seconds, to save a life. Even if the injury isn't serious prompt and appropriate first aid can make the difference between a minor incident, which is soon forgotten, and a frightening and upsetting one with perhaps long-lasting effects.

Figures (1999) released by the Child Accident and Prevention Trust showed that one child dies every day as a result of an unintentional injury. Hopefully our children will not become one of these statistics but accident prevention, basic first aid skills and knowing how to resuscitate a child can really make the difference between life and death.

When one of my boys was a toddler he swallowed a coin. Luckily I had a wonderful nanny who knew just what to do and instantly brought the coin up. I looked on in amazement and shame, because I wouldn't have reacted so quickly and so efficiently. I promptly put myself on a first aid course. Clearly my nanny had been well trained in First Aid, but I doubt I had asked her in the interview whether she held a current first aid certificate. How often have you asked to see a current First Aid certificate from your nanny, au pair or childminder?

We started our company, Safe & Sound Child Safety and First Aid Courses, out of a deep concern that au pairs, in particular, were arriving in the UK with either very little or no experience with children, and yet were often left alone for many hours to care for the children. We wanted to give these au pairs basic training in personal and food hygiene, accident prevention and first aid, so that if the child in their care had an accident, whether it is a minor or major one, they would know what to do.

Prevention is always better than cure and there are no doubt that we are much more safety conscious than previous generations of parents. We hope that the child safety information that we provide on our courses will save many children from harm but we also realise that accidents will happen. When they do it is important that the person caring for the injured child is able to remain calm and to react quickly and effectively. First aid is not rocket science and all of us can learn the basic skills required minimising injury and saving lives. The subjects covered on our courses range from the most life threatening conditions, for example when a baby or child has stopped breathing or is bleeding profusely, to the more common and less serious situations, for example, dealing with a minor fracture, bump on the head or insect bite.

Safe and Sound run courses in the London area. For more information contact them on the telephone number below or visit their web site.

Safe and Sound

60 Normandy Avenue
Barnet
Herts
EN5 2JA

Tel: 0208 449 8722

Email: info@safe-and-sound.org.uk

www.safe-and-sound.org.uk