There is little question that a well-supplied first-aid kit at home or on a worksite can allevite a lot of fears and help expidite healing in certain cases where a minor incident occurs. Bandages, wraps, a little bit of alcohol, cotton balls, swabs and even tweezers or small scissors can be effective for a quick response to a minor cut or injury to a worker or family member.

Sometimes, however, there can be some minor incidents that may not need bandages but may be painful, such as a high ankle sprain or a hairline fracture in a leg. These injuries can be very painful, and often bandages and cotton swabs do not help alleviate the pain so the person could have a clear head and do the right thing in getting proper medical care. Tis has led to a growing question about whether first-aid kits should include some kind of pain- or symptom-relieving, non-prescription medication as something that could be administered right away to help mitigate symptoms that may result from an injury.

[Image courtesy of Flickr user DLG Images via a Creative Commons license]First aid kits have been a mainstay in many households and worksites. But symptom-relieving, over-the-counter medications have not been in these kits. There are a couple of reasons why, and there are some strong guidelines if you were to consider adding medication to a worksite first-aid kit.

There is some controversy about this, and the question has been debated and discussed in several circles. At the end of the day, however, while the ideas of these kinds of general-use, over-the-counter medications included in first-aid kits may seem sound, there is always a danger. As we all know, not everyone could use over-the-counter medications for various reasons – not the least of which could be clashes with any current prescription medications that a person might be taking.

With this in mind, here are a few things to note about these general medications:

1. By rule, regulation or law (depending on where you live), first-aiders are not allowed to actually administer or prescribe any medications for someone who needs first aid. However, they are allowed to help someone take their own medication if the person is conscious but is unable to help himself.

2. Medications are not already included as part of a compliant first aid kit according to many health and safety codes in North America. Certainly there is a reason for this, or the medications would have absolutely been included for years, right?

3. First-aid kits are meant to be universally applied to everyone, which basically means applications externally to the skin area. As medication is usually ingested or injected, the idea of having medications in a first-aid kit, even general-use, over-the-counter medications, is not consistent with the idea of universal application, as everyone will react differently to the same medication due to various factors that cannot often be handled on the spot. So when in doubt, leave it out.

4. However, if there is a specific need for such medications (as in a worksite where pain is often common even in minor incidents), then it is highly recomended that a board-certified physician (not a safety officer) be contracted to write the guidelines and protocols surrounding the use of the medications, and a health-care worker should be designated as the person who would have authority to administer the medication as needed.

Remembering these guidelines should help you determine the safest course of action in regards to administering medications in situations of minor incidents and injuries. As a safety officer, while we all want our workers to be and stay safe and to not feel any pain, the Hippocratic oath comes to mind in that we should not do harm. And not giving medications in most cases will be certainly less harmful compared to the risk when administering such medicines.