When a colleague collapses, cuts a hand badly or is stung and starts to struggle for breath, the first few minutes matter. Often the person who is nearest is not a trained first-aider. This course helps every worker know what to do in those minutes, and how first aid is organised at work.
This is an awareness course. It does not train you to be a first-aider. Real first aid skills, such as CPR, are learned and practised on a hands-on course with an instructor. Nothing here is a qualification.
The main law
In Great Britain, first aid at work is covered by the Health and Safety (First-Aid) Regulations 1981. The regulations are short. They say:
- The employer must provide adequate and appropriate equipment, facilities and people so that employees who are injured or taken ill at work get immediate attention.
- The duty applies to all workplaces, including small ones with fewer than five employees.
- The employer must tell employees what the first-aid arrangements are, including where the equipment, facilities and people are.
- A self-employed person in a prescribed type of undertaking must provide first-aid equipment for their own use.
These duties sit under the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974, the main health and safety law. The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) publishes guidance on the regulations in L74, First aid at work: The Health and Safety (First-Aid) Regulations 1981. It is written for employers. This course refers to it as HSE guidance. Check hse.gov.uk for the current version.
What "first aid" means
First aid is the immediate help given to a person who is injured or ill, to:
- preserve life,
- prevent the condition getting worse, and
- promote recovery, until medical help takes over.
It is not treatment. A first-aider does not diagnose or give medicines. In most cases first aid at work means keeping the person safe and calm, stopping bleeding, and getting an ambulance.
Who the law covers
The regulations cover employees. HSE guidance says employers should also consider the people who are not employees, such as customers, visitors and contractors, when they plan first aid. The employer is not forced by these regulations to treat them, but a sensible plan takes them into account.
Your part as a worker
You do not have to be a first-aider. You do have duties under the 1974 Act: take reasonable care of yourself and others, and co-operate with your employer. In first aid terms that means:
- Know the arrangements. Find out who the first-aiders and appointed persons are, and where the first-aid box is.
- Report accidents and illness, and tell someone when the first-aid box is running low.
- Do not take risks. Making yourself a second casualty helps nobody.
- Call for help early. Calling 999 is always right if the situation is serious.
What the law does not say
The law does not name a particular course, a "certificate" or a fixed number of first-aiders. It does not require a defibrillator. It leaves each employer to decide, from a first-aid needs assessment, what is adequate and appropriate for their workplace. The next lessons explain how.
Key points
- The First-Aid Regulations 1981 apply to all workplaces in Great Britain, however small, with a few specialist exceptions such as diving work, mines and ships.
- The employer provides equipment, facilities and trained people, and tells staff about them.
- HSE guidance L74 explains how.
- This course is awareness only. It is not a first-aider qualification.