A first-aid kit is a tool, but any tool is only as good as the person using it.

First-aid kits are one place where personal needs and practical skills come together. There are ways to prepare for emergencies that have nothing to do with collecting supplies. This includes learning practical skills that you can use to protect yourself and others.

Many practical skills are easy to learn. Some require special certification or formal training. Others just education. Practical skills include learning how to:

• Perform hands-only cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR)
• Operate an automated external defibrillator (AED)
• Apply a tourniquet and control bleeding
• Administer seizure first aid
• Use the contents of a first-aid kit

Family, friends, coworkers, and bystanders—not first responders—are often first on the scene in a medical emergency. Elkins has seen this many times in the field. “One time, we had a patient who had a very bad accident with a circular saw,” she recalls. “There was a lot of blood on the floor. The patient’s coworker, who had no formal training, put all his body weight on the wound and used it to slow the bleeding. He yelled for help until others came and called 911. He saved his coworker’s life because he made the right decision and took action.”

(excerpt from Center for Disease Control and Prevention website)