The Correct Use of an Israeli Dressing

         
        As someone asked, an Israeli dressing is not a salad dressing served on raw greens on Rosh Hashana.
  It is not a savory stuffing served with poultry.  It is however, and ingeniously designed bandage system designed to decrease excessive bleeding and help to prevent hemorrhage following a serious injury, until the patient can receive hospital level trauma care or emergency room with possibly operating room care.

This is an Israeli dressing, with its sterile outer packagings removed.

 
   You never really know when, particularly in the country or in a farm, a really serious injury will result in arterial blood loss.  Although we have emergency helicopters available with medical staff here, they may be busy, and rendering the proper first aid can make the difference between life and death.
     For this reason, I have always stocked what is called an Israeli Dressing.  This comes in a sterile packaging, and when used correctly, allows the user to wrap a pressure dressing and secure it in the field prior to transport to a hospital.  It can also be modified and used as a tourniquet.   Certainly, direct pressure and elevating the injured part should be done, but when blood is rhythmically spurting, this may be your best bet in a pressure dressing prior to immediate transport.  Theoretically, you might even be able to apply a dressing as simple as this, on yourself.
      Although I always kept these with an eye to severe extremity injuries, the excellent video below shows how it might be used as a pressure dressing for head injuries, and for injuries to the trunk as well.  Please watch it, and if you think this might be something useful for you to have in your first aid kits, then these can be purchased through

             Israeli Bandage Supplier

They are also the least expensive sellers of this device that I know.

 (They call it the "Emergency bandage", but I was taught Israeli bandage or Israeli dressing so I refer to it this way.)




This is an excellent video describing its best use.

 


   Spring is an excellent time in which to examine your first aid and medical kits and replace anything aging, or use anything, like aging band-aids, first.

Our prior posts on related subjects are:

http://rationalpreparedness.blogspot.com/2011/12/assembling-your-own-excellent-first-aid.html

http://rationalpreparedness.blogspot.com/2012/03/how-are-your-medical-kits-evacuation.html

http://rationalpreparedness.blogspot.com/2011/09/creating-your-own-emergency-medical-kit.html

Of course,

Complete information on general assemblage of first aid kits is found in my book:

Rational Preparedness:A Primer to Preparedness