A sore throat is generally caused by viruses but when it is a bacterial infection, you must seek a doctor for treatment. In such a condition, the back part of the throat, tongue, tonsils and the soft palate have a tendency to swell. Mononucleosis, the “the kissing disease”, is a viral infection which is said to cause a persistent sore throat. People can contract such infections rampantly from the environment and from people they are working closely with. Running nose, congestion, red eyes, diarrhea in children, breathing difficulty are some typical symptoms of a sore throat.

First Aid for Sore Throat
Experts suggest that viral infections do not work with antibiotics and hence should be not forced to heal with drugs. First aid or home remedies are the best treatment for a viral sore throat. It lasts for not more than a week and can be take care of easily.

• To prevent throat irritation, gargle with salt water once in each hour
• Sip on hot fluids often
• Use a humidifier or vaporizer in your room as it well help soothe the swollen air passage
• Quit smoking or the use of tobacco
• Throat lozenges help in providing relief from the swelling and irritation of the throat
• Cough drops can also work for comfort
• Use nasal sprays or a decongestant orally to reduce congestion (not recommended for children aged below 2 years)
• Get plenty of rest

If the sore throat lasts for two weeks with little or less relief, consult a doctor. Also look out for additional symptoms such as high fever (above 101°F), difficulty swallowing, breathing drooling, vomiting, headache, abdominal pain, etc to seek medical help.

Fainting is described as a brief loss of consciousness and lasts for not more than a few seconds to 30 minutes. Its occurrence is primarily related to decreased blood supply to the brain and is quiet common among teens. The associated causes for fainting include stress, depression, anxiety, skipping meals, anemia, effects of certain drugs, low blood pressure and even diabetes. A person generally experiences nausea, dizziness and haziness before fainting. He or she cannot even remember the fall.

First Aid for Fainting
Unless not proven otherwise, fainting is regarded as a medical emergency. If a person faints, you need to do the following:

• Do not let the person fall to the ground
• Make the person lie down with head below the heart level and legs raised 8-12 inches high to ease blood flow to the brain
• In case, you cannot make the person lie down make him or her sit down with the head bent forward between the knees for the same purpose – to increase blood flow to the brain
• Unzip and loosen the clothes, belts of the person to free airways
• Do not shake the person to consciousness
• Do not force food or drinks
• Check the pulse rate

The person should awake within a minute after all the above endeavors are made and if he or she doesn’t, you should seek immediate medical assistance.

Migraine headaches have become one of the most common phenomenons in the emergency departments of hospitals. Certain kinds of food such as chocolate, cheese, alcohol, hunger, stress, birth control pills and smoking have been cited as the associated causes of migraine headaches. Migraines can be mild, moderate to severe and can last between 4-72 hours. Migraines affect a large section of the population, especially women. While mild to moderate migraines can be treated at home, severe ones involving paralysis on one side of the body, fever, unconsciousness requires immediate medical attention.

First Aid for Migraine
Most migraineurs can manage mild to moderate migraines at home. If the headache seems to be progressive in spite of these remedies, then medical treatment becomes necessary.

• Apply a cold compressor to exact painful spot
• Rest on comfortable pillows that can support your neck and head
• Try resting in a dark, quiet room with no odors
• Try withdrawing yourself away from stressful situations and surroundings
• Sleep is the best remedy for migraines though it doesn’t come too easily
• Drink moderate amount of caffeine
• Resort to over the counter medicines for migraines such as non-steroidal anti-inflammatory medicines or a combination of medicines available at drug stores but with due recommendation of a doctor

An important part of migraine treatment is follow-up which most migraineurs don’t do because they lose hope in the therapy. Medical care is essential when migraines turn unbearable and is related with trauma to the head.

Diarrhea is described as excessive (three or more) motions or watery feces that occurs in less than 24 hours. Such a condition is usually indicative of a gastrointestinal distress or disorder. Experts suggest that in most of the cases, diarrhea is caused by viruses or toxins and in lesser cases due to digestive disturbances and parasites.

The typical symptoms of diarrhea include watery feces, abdominal pain, vomiting and stools mixed with blood or mucus. Diarrhea is considered dangerous because it rids the body of essential salts and nutrients that can lead to shock, electrolyte imbalances and eventually death of a person.

First Aid for Diarrhea
Listed below are immediate ways treat loose motions that mainly comprises of replacing the loss of body fluids with immediate rehydration measures:

• Oral rehydration powder packets are available in the market, or
• Mix 8 teaspoons of sugar in 3/4th teaspoons of common salt in one litre of cooled boiled water and take as oral rehydration, or
• Drink coconut water, or
• Buttermilk, or
• Drink plenty of water

Seek physician’s help immediately after complying with the above immediate measures to get relief from diarrhea.

All snakes are not venomous and neither are all venomous bites fatal as the severity of the snake bite in the second case depends on many factors such as dry bite, size of the snake, etc. However, a snake bite can cause allergic reactions or even infections in many victims.

First aid for snake bite should include – reassuring the person as in some cases victims die of fear rather than the quantity of venom injected, to stop the venom to spread further and to get medical help.

First Aid for Snake Bite
Snake bites should be immediately attended to in the following ways:

• Calm the victim down to rest
• Do not let the person stand, walk or move around
• Immobilize the limb (arm or leg) with the help of a sling or splint and bandage to keep stiff but do not apply too much pressure
• Keep the affected limb below the heart level
• Do not let the victim panic as increased heart rate can cause the venom to spread more quickly in the body
• Remove rings, accessories, etc that can cause the bitten area to swell
• Do not cover the bitten area except with a sterile dressing after washing off with running water and soap
• Get medical help immediately

Treatments for Snake Bite
Though there are suction instruments for sucking the venom out of the body of the victim, it should be used within 5 minutes of the bite. Till date, the most effective remedy for treating poisonous snake bites is the anti-venom serum.

A hiccup is an unexpected and absolutely involuntary contraction of the diaphragm muscle that maybe caused due to quick swallowing of food or drinks. Therefore, many times it is also regarded as a reflex for choking as it is related to eating and drinking. Hiccups are generally regarded as not serious but when it persists for more than 30 minutes, medical attention becomes necessary suggest experts.

Some immediate remedies to get rid of the hiccups include holding one’s breath or drinking water. In the first case, the carbon dioxide levels in the blood increases and the hiccupping actually stops whilst in the second case, the vagus nerve that extends from the brain to the stomach is stimulated by drinking water which lessens the degree of hiccups.

First Aid for Hiccups
Here is a list of some quick remedies for hiccups:

• Hold your breath
• Drink water
• Frighten or startle yourself with unexpected things
• Use smelling salts
• Pull your tongue hard
• Place half a teaspoon of dry sugar on the back of your tongue (repeat thrice in an interval of two minutes and use corn syrup in case of sugar for children)

Treatment for Hiccups
Medical treatment becomes essential when the hiccups persist. Some treatments for severe hiccups are:

• Chlorpromazine (Thorazine) maybe the first medication your doctor may prescribe to treat severe hiccups. Other drugs such as baclofen (Lioresal) and phenytoin (Dilantin) have also proved helpful for treating severe hiccups.
• Surgery (the phrenic nerve that controls the diaphragm is removed).

Beginning with the statistics is always a little daunting when advising people about the importance of first aid measures; however, these facts actually help one to understand the near misses that can help save lives if timely help is given to people drowning. Drowning, a scary thought, is a reality that figures as the fourth leading cause of accidental death with over 4,000 people drowning every year, of which about one-third are children below the age of 14 years.

The need for first aid measures to deal with drowning
While the circumstances for drowning are different for children and adults, the chances for it resulting in a fatality are nearly the same. Many a time, adults may want to cool off in hot weather and think a swig of their favorite alcoholic beverage before or during a swim will do the trick; it is truly rash to do so. Combining boating with alcohol intake is another injudicious idea as alcohol interferes with good judgment and is a major factor of adults drowning. The need for first aid measures is very high as drowning incidents rise due to a variety of factors, mainly bad judgment of personal risk level or wrong assessment of water depth/currents.

• First aid helpers at a scene of drowning need to first ascertain whether it is safe to attempt a rescue. Then they should check the victim and send someone to get additional help, call 911 and care for the person until help arrives.
• The victim must be first removed from the water. The caregiver needs to check whether the drowning person is conscious and breathing. If the victim is not breathing, trying to remove water from the victim’s lungs will only waste precious time so the better part of valor would be to remove any obstructions-weeds or excess mud- from the victim’s mouth and open the airway to enable proper mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.
• Tilting the head by doing a chin-up helps to open access to the victim’s airway and the first aid giver can once again try to give rescue breathing to the person. If the person does not respond and air still does not go in, one can give children and adults abdominal thrusts using the Heimlich maneuver to clear the airway. Once the airway is clear, the necessary mouth-to-mouth and chest compression can be administered.
• Hypothermia may develop due to the drop in body temperatures below 35 C (95 F) and if the drowning victim displays any symptoms like shivering and slurred speech, confusion, sleepiness, clumsiness, the first aid giver needs to be alert for this. A warm bath and hot drinks help a hypothermia victim to slowly build up the body heat necessary to overcome the condition and casual movements by the victim like stretching legs will help to improve circulation. However, care should be taken not to rub the skin of the drowning victim.

It is very important to understand the underlying cause of sunstroke before attempting first aid measures. Sunstroke is connected to the sudden inability to disperse body heat through perspiration, particularly after strenuous physical activity and the heat retained in the body causes a rise in body temperature. This can manifest itself in excessively high fever and can cause permanent damage to internal organs and possibly prove fatal, if not treated in time. The recovery of a victim of sunstroke depends on the heat duration and intensity that he/she was exposed to and the goal of every first aid giver in such a circumstance should be to maintain circulation and reduce body temperature as quickly as possible.

Recognizing the symptoms of Heatstroke/Sunstroke
Some of the major symptoms indicative of sunstroke are victim’s complaints about headache, nausea and feelings of dizziness; red, blotchy, dry and very hot skin after the sweating has stopped and a rapid pulse rate. A victim of sunstroke will develop high fever, tend to get disoriented at times and his/her pupils may become very small. Some persons affected by sunstroke are known to fall unconscious and suffer convulsions as well.

Soothing first aid for Sunstroke cases
Since sunstroke occurs due to rise in body temperatures, it is imperative that the heat be dispersed by cooling the victim.

• The first step would be to remove their clothing, bring them in to a shady spot and fan them to make a difference immediately.
• Sponging the victim’s body with cool water and massaging their limbs vigorously helps to move cooled blood into the body cavity.
• Ice or alcohol can cause damage and is at best avoided.
• The first aid giver needs to contact emergency medical services or 911, if the sunstroke victim falls unconscious as this condition can be alarming because it often causes major damage to body systems like the brain, kidney, liver and gastric tract. Unconsciousness in a victim of sunstroke that continues beyond two hours usually leads to permanent disability.
• All constricting garments need to be loosened and if immersion of the victim in cool water is not possible, then the sponging method should be followed. The sunstroke victim can also be wrapped in wet sheets and kept under a fan for faster cooling of body temperature.
• The head and neck area of the sunstroke victim as well as the armpits and groin are usually the sites that are hottest; these require cold compresses consistently, until medical help is at hand.
• A sunstroke victim should not be given anything by mouth; even water is best avoided, until their condition has improved.

Preventing sunstroke: staying cool
Parents are advised never to leave their children or pets in a parked car as the temperature can rise to 135 degrees in less than ten minutes, causing death. Any strenuous physical activity should be limited to the cooler time of the day and lightweight clothing that repels heat should be warm in the hotter months.

Drinking plenty of fluids, especially water, helps one to stay cool.

A breathing problem is indicative of respiratory distress and can manifest itself in many ways. Some victims describe it as a sudden shortness of breath, inability to take a deep breath, gasping for air or feeling like they are not getting enough air. Difficulty in breathing is often referred to Dyspnea and giving first aid helps ease this breathing problem in a timely manner, before it causes more distress to the person.

Cause for alarm: determining a breathing problem
If one suffers shortness of breath after a round of regular exercise or climbing stairs, it is perfectly normal and is not always a medical emergency.

However, if there is previous history of illness, infections like pneumonia, acute bronchitis, whooping cough, or epiglottises or possible heart disease, asthma, emphysema, chronic bronchitis or even heart failure, it can result in sudden breathing problems. Other causes include injury to the neck, chest wall or lungs; a collapsed lung occurs if the victim has emphysema or asthma, but is also known to happen spontaneously in young, healthy people. Being at high altitudes is another reason for causing breathing problem in young and old people. Cigarette smoking or breathing secondhand smoke and pulmonary embolism, or a blood clot in the lung can cause very abrupt and severe difficulty breathing too. Sometimes, this breathing problem can develop into a life-threatening allergic reaction, if left untreated. This is why proper and timely first aid helps save lives in the event of a breathing problem.

Understanding the gravity of the situation: breathing problems and disorders
Close to 44 million Americans suffer allergies and asthma-related breathing problems and still many thousands have breathing difficulties due to gray, gritty smog and air polluted by poorly tuned engines and cigarette smoke emitted by people around them. Those allergic to some types of shellfish, nuts, medications and insect bites can suffer an allergic reaction called anaphylactic shock; reactions beginning within minutes of exposure to the allergy-causing substance. This kind of breathing problem causes the victim’s airways to narrow, making it difficult to breathe while the heartbeat races and blood pressure drops. This situation can be fatal and the shock can kill a person if he/she is not treated within 15 minutes.

• Call emergency medical service or 911.
• Help person get into a comfortable position and loosen constricting clothing.
• Give person CPR, if trained to do so and keep victim calm till paramedics arrive.

Preventive measures: how to avoid breathing problems
Persons aware of a breathing problem need to avoid exposure to allergic substances or agents that induce asthma, if they suffer from it. Common sense measures to keep breathing problems at bay include avoiding walking, running or jogging on roads with heavy automobile traffic that yield toxic gases. Those possessing a gas furnace need to have it checked once a year for carbon monoxide leaks. Being careful about never leaving the car running in a closed garage helps prevent any mishap due to carbon monoxide poisoning, which is a strong possibility.