Hello, welcome back. I'm here with Laura from St. JOHN. And he's here to talk to us about all of that initial, what to do if there's a high temperature, who to call if there's a problem and helpful information for new parents, and also go through it. I've got their first aid kits that if you're a health partners member, you'll get sent out, which has got quite a few of the valuable first parents things in it. So leave that on my lap now. That Howard, thank you for having now we always say what is your best advice for new parents just to remain calm and not really, it's an exciting time in your life and don't freak out.

Comments, okay, I guess especially in your industry and a lot of what we're going to talk about today, that is really important. So just keep your head on. And normally the first person to come across something that's not going well either completely freaks out or gets trapped. What are we going to do first? Yeah. So if you're that freakout person, then know that they'll probably be the second person that comes and goes, What's out party?

Yeah, absolutely. So we're going to comment, try and go through some really important first steps. Obviously, this is just a video for you. So we can't go through everything. And a lot of the time will refer back to maybe a first aid course that will be really helpful, but some easy things for you to remember. So in this pack, we've got four new parents we have our sneaky but very important duck thermometer.

Now hasn't the thermometer industry comm Ford certainly has faced in the moment his forehead for mom And there's your track de undertand or Andromeda monitor. But what would a normal temperature be for a baby? So, if the temperature is under 38, that's generally considered a temporary change, but it's when it's 38 or above is when you would want to seek some medical support for that. Medical age. Yeah. Both think, have I got too many legs?

Yeah, absolutely. So it could be a matter of assessing where your babies how many layers on them, how many blankets, you know, their environment. If they're in the cost or the cost that you might want to get them out, put them down naturally, perfectly. And so don't get me consider two weeks is sad. I and grandma who's the hot food, it's been hanging on to the baby the blanket, maybe take the blanket off. Give it maybe half an hour and then recheck your baby.

To be honest, generally, if a baby is unwell, it's quite a bit irritable and cranky. Your instinct is yet Same way, you might check their temperature, they might have just woken up from a nap. And then you know, you take them out of their sleeping bag and things like that. And you might notice them quite quickly. Yeah. So yeah, it couldn't hurt to you know, give it a little bit of time.

Okay. Are you calling for a doctor? Yes. And obviously, the thermometer industry, which is very dramatic, quite very expensive. Oh my god, the forehead thermometers are like $90. And you know, sometimes having a trusty basic one just to double check with because it might be and they tend to have very specific ways of measuring temperatures so maybe it's not being done exactly right.

And you get a very high or very low temperature so sometimes just doing a double check before you get your knickers in a twist. And just touching your baby and feeling it and thinking Oh God, you feel hot. Oh, actually, the thermometer is saying that you are fought but I don't feel like you're absolutely you wouldn't really point the thermometer Unless you actually feel Yeah, and they're really quite cranky, but if you know some babies with a very high temperature can can look quite unwell. And there's such a thing as a febrile seizure. Hmm, absolutely. Yeah.

Super convulsion. So no every child with a fever will have a motion in reverse just a fancy word for favor, so people can vote in new Nori. If your child is having one. It happens when this all children and babies generally under the age of six, you will notice the twitching and the jerkiness. You could notice the rolling back of the eyes and look kangaroo glorifies kangaroo. But you know it's it's something that happens to children they they have difficulties regulating the temperature and there could be a sudden spike in temperature.

So it does happen it you know, can be really scary but it's just move your child out of the environment. won't say they're in the court costs eight off, pull them out, take their clothes off, let them cool down naturally, you wouldn't put them in a cold bath or anything like that. You might open up a window or a door or something that naturally normally that's just stop that from happening and then get. Yeah. And you know if that was to happen, it might be that you want to get a follow up medical. Because obviously, that's got a high temperature and I've had a convulsion rate.

So whether you know, you can get into the GP around quite quickly, or if if it's two o'clock in the morning and your only option is maybe a home doctor or a trip to your local emergency department. Just more to think well yes, the convulsion is one part of it, but also Is there something else going on? Yeah. never hurt to get them checked out. And sorry. If it was the first time that and you know, parents would be freaked out if there was a febrile convulsion the very first time that had happened.

Yeah. So for the first time, it's good, we always recommend to call for an ambulance, because it is their first time and it would be a really need to be checked out just to see if there's anything underlying there. If it is something that's been happening a few times, you will have some advice from the doctors from the first time that has happened to know, you know, that it should just be a doctor's visit should be sufficient unless you're, you know, you've been instructed otherwise from from your doctor. Yes. And obviously, if your baby has a high temperature, but always encouraging you to get some medical advice, you know, don't just give panadol because there's generally a reason for a temperature. So just by making it go away, doesn't mean that was treated the cause.

Obviously, once you've had that input, then you're going to be told by that health professional, the best way to manager and we know that panadol certainly lowers the temperature, but it certainly doesn't treat the cause. So you know, first steps is to identify what 100 Temperature is and then to pick the most appropriate follow up for that little, little human at the right time. And parents, especially first baby, first time, you know, you think Oh, yes, babies 38 five. I've checked it twice. The house isn't too hot, the babies really irritable or really sleepy. And you know, you might ring one of the headlines on the back of the blue book, and you'll notice that there's the health direct line or the pregnancy birth and baby.

Both of them are government funded health lines. If you're really unsure of the first steps, the right resource someone to kind of go through the key points, what are you going to do, and they will generally all encourage you to have some sort of medical follow up. And also knowing that when you register your baby, do I have ambulance cover? You know, if you are going to be calling an ambulance for a febrile seizure, is this gonna be covered? Or however, you know, ambulance cover itself is not very expensive if it's not included. Just having that reassurance If knowing you're not going to be slumped 1500 bucks for a trip to the emergency department is good to know so that you're not gonna feel a bit concerned about the choices that might be given on the helpline.

And the other thing, sorry, just gonna come down for a second is some parents will armed themselves with something like this, which is the first day book, which might in some cases help to give you some insight into the best treatment. And in some cases, you know, it might be a high temperature, what am I going to do? Or you know, just using your common sense as well about what to do. But often, you know, if you think, Oh, I did the first aid course and I can't retain all of that having a resource that's not Google. Absolutely. It is very, very important and maybe something that's been written by someone that's a professional in this area, like like, john, that's what they do.

So yeah, that's important to know. That's a bit scary high temperature. We haven't finished yet. So what is my baby Brenda, and her Auntie Felicity has been coughing and coughing and coughing and coughing and she wants to come and see Brenda. She's very excited about it. What should we do?

People are not feeling very well then they should know. Or anyone like that's the first it's in any infection control to minimize transfer. So sorry Felicity and you know things like hand washing. Okay, after hotels. Yeah, yeah. So we always recommend if you are administering beside on someone to give you a hospital wash, and if you can't get to a top then you know, emergency situations, you know, you can get some hands on because I give you a bit of a wash and so it's really, really best practices.

TV shows. Bye bye On watching any TV show and he got the scotch washed his hands go. Yes. And it's bad. Don't we know that our hands are the biggest transfer of germs. So you know, let me give you baby like all of a sudden, you have transferred across and you didn't meet her yet, but it's important to parenting yourself as well.

Yeah. And that's if your baby somewhere. Yeah, don't take it. And if you've got a new little baby, especially with an immature immune system, you know, being like mama bear, like, you can come later, when you feeling a bit better. Absolutely. And he's a hidden gem in the world.

Yeah, ain't gonna stop pestering James, if you're coughing and sneezing all over the place, or you've got diarrhea, because all of those buttons are transferable not only to the mother but also to the baby. And we know that with breastfeeding. The mom does, her body does the very best it can to protect the baby by secreting the right antibodies that the baby needs at the time. But, you know, he can only protect it so much. And that little baby, especially in the first eight weeks has this new system that's trying to get started. So you know, really being careful with sick people and trying to limit that transfer of germs, which we say all the time.

And thank you have to be mean to Felicity so don't come over and she's like, That's not fair and you're like well you know next week we'll be here. And so what about things like choking more terrified Yeah, I think everyone's gonna choking but when you become a mom, but something really plays on your mind as to how to how do I deal with this? I'm sorry, I do have a mannequin here would you like what's the mannequins name? Let's call her. Okay, so for choking for a baby. What we want to do is pop them into the recovery position.

So recovery position, we pop our hands like store around, like size and all around and have that done their body and we loot that and turn them over into recovery and that's recovery for a baby. That recovery could feel better on another hand, depending on whether you're left handed or right handed it I want to show you, okay, so for choking, we want to call an ambulance as possible for an infant. So we'd be calling an ambulance, we shout out to someone else if I can, and if I can't then just call them pop them on speaker and then you treat the baby. Um, so the way that we would treat tracking for an infant is different than a bit of a blackboard and it would look like kind of check to see if the object has come out. We want to do five things. checking each time because you might have just watching visiting and you don't want to keep hitting anybody.

And is that the same process if it wasn't at all? Absolutely, yeah, yeah, it's, I don't, I don't be sitting in a chat as most people generally check my notes down yet. But you know, babies can see they got asked that better than you and I'll see things. I'll pop them in them out. Yes, I'll find things you don't know. popping them out.

So you want to do five back flows. And if that didn't work, we know that ambulance is on its way what we'd end up doing it from the chest for us, but we'd normally pop them on a hard surface surface. So on it on a table or something hard. Yeah. So what we do is it's similar to how we do our compressions with a PA. So straight under the arms.

This is the part that we're actually using. We want to do five of those that we're putting in there. Yeah. 345 now What and what we're gonna do is we're going to pop them back over okay and we're gonna go again we're gonna keep doing five and five so five that close yet five chests Ross, we keep doing that until the ambulance comes. Okay, now this is the baby's breathing, okay, if baby stops breathing, then we go straight into TPR which we're going to cover all about saying and you know, sometimes with a baby, a new baby when they're breastfeeding, they will just choke briefly on breast milk. And so in those situations that can just be sitting the baby up it's a bit like you know, when you go Oh, I went down the wrong heart.

And I rarely do they change cover color very much and you just hit them up because they're back around and they're like, so they do correct themselves with that kind of milky wrong pipe. But obviously, a true choking on something can look as, as you see babies can be very, you know, start to grab and reach and get all sorts of things in there. A little mouse that um, so it's great to know and that's First Responders stuff is very important. Yes, you don't have time to be talking to them. If you're the only person around you really need to be proactive there, have them on speaker managing that hopefully someone else is around that can do that for you. Which is good.

All right. sunscreen and sunburn is another interesting thing I personally get asked a lot in, in my practice, because no one wants their babies to get burnt or have any sun's out. You know, what sort of scant sunscreen this one says I can't use it for six months. So what do I do when when can I take my baby out, and it is important to read the manufacturer's information. babies get sunburned just that way get sunburned so you're not going to take them to the beach and just pop them on the sand because not only that, they can get things like some story which can happen very quickly and because they're a smaller little person, and but certainly reading the manufacturer's information. If you're in situation where you know that there's a chance that your baby will be exposed to fun using a touchscreen appropriate to their age, which you'll be able to find in all of the shops.

But you'd say did the other thing is boons themselves. I remember when my baby was little I was having a coffee. He never slept in money and then the coffee accidentally spilled on him. And that kind of first responded then kind of advice. What would you generally say to parents, I always say with burns. All burns are treated the same, so cool running water.

But with face to face so tiny, it gets really awkward. You don't want to put a whole baby underneath a culture like that and then respond well to that and they could have quite a reaction to that. So we just want to call that area just that area. But yeah, and it also comes down to you know, the safety you know, your house Yeah. Have the travel cops always really handy as well, no scenario but you know, making sure your handles are really nice to try to prevent all sorts of things. But yeah, sometimes trading something on that such a little thing is really, really hard.

It is and that's where a lot of again the helpline and being a doctor or if it's a more severe burn, then we want you to call an ambulance or get some quite quick medical advice. And you know, a sunburn can add some good can presents as badly as a disability. So, yes, you know, not feeling like, oh, what am I going to do? You know, get that appropriate advice and know how to treat it. Well. Excellent.

Well, the last thing we're going to cover is that Dr. ABC, Mm hmm. Which I know I will. I go through it a lot, lots of education. And it may there's still a huge amount of the population that don't know what to do in an emergency situation. Absolute Yep, sorry. Um, I thought ABC so I mean, d d for danger.

It seems so unnatural, but it's something we all do every day really we don't enter an environment that danger is gonna be a danger or casualties. So, you know, just assessing danger with a baby. I mean, you could be danger Bingo. hysterical man. Yeah. So obviously you need to calm yourself down, you know, if you know, we were talking about with your coffee, you know, putting coffee cups down, you know, making sure that no more that, you know, danger is happening.

So just assessing and make sure that you know, it's safe to respond. Responses always know, as a mom, you check for responses. You know, your your baby's having a really good sleep and you're thinking you know, we check for danger. We check for a response all the time. We obviously aren't gonna be clapping babies, we might do for an adult to check for response. So the best way to check for a response on a baby finger in their hand, so when they're sleeping, what they will do is they'll close your finger, okay?

So you don't have to wait for them to do that you will know that they're okay. And the other thing you could do is tickle that thing as well. You just want to get some kind of a reaction tonight. Okay, so you've got a response. That's great, you know, everything's okay. But if you're not getting a response, that's when you know, we really should be sending for help going for an ambulance or calling out to someone.

Then we move on to checking the airway. We just want to make sure that nothing blocking the airway. I think this is really important. I mean, it's really it's really important for everybody, but babies in particular, are renowned for putting things in their mouth. It's really important that we took that away, just make sure that nothing's walking away. If something's blocking here away, put them in recovery, and then go to.

Okay, so we're trying to scrape that out. And then we need to check for breathing. Okay, sorry. The way that we check for breathing is by looking, listening and feeling tight. So you might be able to hear the baby's breathing, you might see, and you really need to know that baby's breathing, you have to pick up on three things. But by doing these three things, Look, listen feel for no more than 10 seconds.

Breathing quite good. If I just want branding, then. Yes, and you know, it's important because I've had it firsthand actually a man whose baby was was fine and then started to choke and then stopped breathing and She just completely freaked out, and was gonna have to end. And so it's important, you know, you can tell that there's something not right. And to take almost that split second, like, deep breath. And you know, I have to go through these doctors ABC and so sending for help.

So even if you're freaking out, no, it's not breathing, you could have already started to make some contact with over ambulance so that they can also help to talk you through today. Yes, absolutely. And that that's the other thing too. We feel that we have to retain all the information, retain as much as you can. But in those emergency situations, you should have an ambulance. You know, what you're trying to do with this data going to be able to refresh your mind.

You know, submit the papers that you might not remember yet. And they're you know, very quick to answer the phones that you talk to talk to you through what to do, and but we'll go through the more in depth and recessed initial recess stuff and in Just a second. So we're just gonna run through an action plan, which is not going to in any first aid situation, Okay, so the first thing that we do is we check the danger, just want to make sure that it's safe for us to approach our casualty in this case, the baby, just want to make sure that there's nothing dangerous in the way and if we can move those dangers and fix those dangers, then we do sorry. And when it's safe to approach we do. So we go through danger, and we want to go through response. So the way that we check for a response on a baby is just use our fingers or a thumbs just in their hands like what will happen now as a mom, you check for a response to the baby a lot.

And you don't really want to wake them up in their face on co sleeping because most of the time the house they think so you just want to see if found their fingers will curl around. If their fingers come around your finger or your thumb then you know you've got a response and you know, everything's okay. Okay. But if you're not getting a response, that's concerning. Sorry. Do fingers and thumbs in the hands.

The other thing we can do is tickle their faces a little bit and normally that's enough to get a response. It is non responsive when we really need to send for help, we need to call for an ambulance. So if there's someone else nearby, shout out to them, ask them to call an ambulance for you. If you're on your own, grab your phone, call for an ambulance, call triple zero hop on hold so that you can help help your baby in the meantime, as much as 10 for help. The next thing we want to do is check the airway. What we want to do is just say that there's nothing blocking the airway.

And we don't want to tilt baby's head back to back with babies dog developing the next door. I'm quite sensitive switches to the head that was a little bit understated anything blocking the airway. If there is something in there, what we need to do is get it out and that's how we do that is we put baby in recovery like this. Around the chin. head off to mean to recovery with your finger. You want to Try and get that object out.

Okay? Once you've done that, then you want to check the breathing. Okay? You want to listen and feel okay? For about about 10 seconds by more than 10 seconds. Okay?

So my baby. If we've checked the airway and there's nothing in the airway, then we can go straight into checking for breathing down like sorry. Listen, and we'll look to see if we can see by breathing, then we'll pop baby back into recovery where we might some ambulance to come, baby is not breathing, then we need to go straight into our CPR. So what we'll do is we're basically straight under the armpits in the center of the chest is where we're heating. So we're going straight through here without two fingers, and we want to go straight down to about a third of the depth of the chest, and we're going to do 30 compressions compressions we're gonna do, we're gonna do a little bit, just a little rod of the chessboard and putting in a little breath. We put in our two breaths, and we go straight back into our compressions and we do 30 and 230 and 230 and two, and when you do put the breast in your mouth, we'll probably go over the noise as well.

That's okay. The air can go in through the math and the noise that is absolutely fine. Okay, so you know that the ambulance is on, it's fine, and you just keep doing CPR in the meantime with your 30 compressions and two breaths. If you feel uncomfortable during the breath. What you can do is you can just do the compression but we do recommend doing the fret You know, when his baby starts breathing again, you'll be able to see the baby be able to see, you know, it will stop, the baby will start to move, you'll be able to hear those breaths coming in. And there should be some kind of baby vomiting, those sorts of things.

Once baby is breathing, what we want to do is pop baby into recovery. Like sorry, while we wait for the ambulance to come, and we want to monitor the baby to see if there's any other injuries or anything else that we might notice notice beforehand, when a keep baby in recovery, while we wait for that to come. Well, that was all very interesting. Thank you so much for coming and giving us some, you know, emergency information and a great basis to start from. But obviously in this little, you know, small, small course, online, we can't teach you everything. So we really encourage all new parents to go into a first aid course there's lots of specific courses for the new parent.

Yeah, absolutely. So we have a caring for kids. Don't wait around, I think we run most evenings and quite a few evenings and on the weekends. And that's specific, obviously, first aid and management of, you know, small child issues. And with a lot of health funds, they're really encouraging you to do it and you will get a rate guide as well. So it becomes quite an expensive, but really, you know, how can you put a price on knowing what to do in those emergency situations.

So thank you for for tuning in. We have another section on first aid for the slightly older baby and a bit further along in the course but hopefully that's got some great information for you.