Medical Kit

Today I am going to talk about putting together a medical kit. I believe I started this once before, but never completed it. This will be more than a simple first-aid kit, it will be a little more comprehensive than that. You will not be able to do the work of a doctor, but you may just be able to treat most minor injuries up to and including gunshot and knife wounds.

TOOLS: Curved tweezers, straight tweezers, curved forceps, surgical scissors, curved dental pic, curved and straight suture needles, suture thread, oral thermometer, disposable razor, G.I. can opener, eye patch, plastic eye cup, glass eye cup, emergency space blanket, extractor kit for snake bites plastic finger tip protectors (3 different sizes).

BANDAGES, ETC: 4"x4" sterile pads (10), 3"x3" sterile pads (3), 2"x2" sterile pads (10), 3" gauze bandage (10 yds.), 2" flexible gauze (3.5 yds.), adhesive tape (.5"x5 yds.), clear 1st aid tape (1"x10 yds.), 1st aid tape (2"x5 yds.), gauze finger bandages (2), 3/4" band-aids (40), cotton swabs (24), sterile cotton balls (10), butterfly closures (10), ace type bandages (2), facial tissue (15 two ply), toilet paper (small travel roll).

CLEANING & DISINFECTING: 1st aid disinfectant spray, tincture Merthiolate, petroleum jelly, antiseptic-premoistened towelette, bar of soap, covered soap dish, eye wash, eye drops.

PILLS: Aspirin (100 tabs.), Excedrin Rapid Release/extra strength (100 caps.), Dristan for allergies (48 tabs), Sinus tablets (24 tabs), Primatine for asthma (48 tabs), Dramamine for motion sickness (12 tabs), Rolaids (24 tabs).

Misc: Icy-Hot rub (3 oz. tube), Hydrocortisone cream (1 oz. tube), Blistex lip ointment (1 oz), lip balm (2 tubes), nasal spray, instant cold pack, cough drops (2 kinds 15 tabs each kind), insect repellent (minimum of 40% Deet), after bite sting reliever, witch hazel (8 oz), aloe (cream, jell or liquid), pepto bismal (small bottle) water purification tablets (100).

That is what I keep in my medical kit. Besides that I have small, personal first-aid kits for everyone in my crew. There are many more things that could be added if someone in your group has the knowledge to use them. What I have listed here is what I feel that everyone should know how to administer. There is one more important item that should be put into your kit. That is your prescription medications. Only you know what you need and you should know how many you might need. I personally also keep some vitamins and supplements that can replace some of my meds if I would happen to run out. Those who feel they may wind up taking to the woods or have a place in that type of an area should learn all they can about using natural medicines. There are many plants that are excellent substitutes for what we buy in the store. I Hope to do a blog soon on some of these that I know. SURVIVE!!!

Until next time check out my political blog at: http://www.therealamericanpolitics.blogspot.com.

Medicine

This time we are going to talk about medicine. What I mean is that I think that we need to cover the topic of prescription medicines and what we would do if a time came that you could not get them. Many people in today's world, especially those of us who are considered to be past middle age, are on prescription medicines. Heart and cholesterol medicines are the most common and pills to cure depression are right up there. What happens if the SHTF and you cannot get your regular medicines? As I have alluded to in the past, I have done a quite a bit of research on the use of vitamins and supplements in place of prescribed medications. There are natural vitamins and supplements for virtually anything that there is a prescription pill for. The only other way is to get as far ahead with your pills as possible. Get them by the three month supply if possible and try to keep a couple of prescriptions ahead. This is not always possible, which is why I am suggesting vitamins and supplements. Even though you stay on your prescription now, you may want to stash some vitamins and supplements away for emergency use. Now let us take a look at some of the ones that I know about. All of the vitamins and supplements that I name here I have taken or am currently taking.

First we will look at the heart. High blood pressure, high cholesterol, and other heart related problems. Garlic is one of the best supplements for the heart. Garlic both lowers blood pressure but also lowers cholesterol. If I took no other supplements, I would include garlic in my survival supplies. The one vitamin that is good for the heart is vitamin "E". Vitamin E has other uses but is a help for the heart. Fish oil is another supplement that is good for keeping a healthy heart. Niacin, Iron and Hawthorn Berries are three more heart health supplements. Some of these supplements I would advise even if you never had a heart problem. Just as a preventative you could take these as they will not hurt you and may help. Here again, garlic is the one I would take other than vitamin "E".

Keeping your immune system in shape is important. This allows you to fight off things like the common cold, flu and other immune system attacking viruses. Here you also have multiple choices. Cod liver oil is one choice as is zinc. There are also two vitamins that are essential to immune system health. These two are "C" and "E". Cod liver oil contains vitamins "A" and "D" and I believe that these are better taken into the system than the vitamins in tablet form. During the summer I take enough cod liver oil to gain 100% of my A and D, 50mg zinc, 400iu vitamin E and 1,000 mg vitamin C. In October I double that and continue the double dose until the end of March. I never get flu shots and have never had the flu. Even my colds are less severe than some of my friends.

Those of you with joint pain from arthritis or some other natural cause might want to try Glucosamine-Crondroitin. If you have liver problems try Milk Thistle. To keep your metabolism up take a good powerful B-complex vitamin. Depression calls for St. Johns Wort, while allergies call for bee pollen and/or honey. If your memory is not too good you may want to try Ginkgo Bilboa. One thing that I feel that a survivalist needs is good night vision. I use a Billberry/Lutein pill to keep mine up and it seems to work for me.

As you can see, this is quite a list and it could be longer but I hesitate to recommend something I have not personally tried. Besides the vitamins I take, which I have listed earlier, I take a multiple vitamin/mineral pill. I feel that these vitamins and supplements have kept me healthy and feeling younger than I am. So, by all means, keep on your prescriptions and try to have somewhat of a supply ahead. At the same time begin planning for the worst case scenario. If you are taking the vitamins and supplements having a two year supply on hand at all times is the best way to go. Most have at least a two year shelf life, so if you have a two year supply on hand you can just keep taking them to rotate your stock. When you finish a bottle, buy a new one, put the new one in storage and use the oldest one from storage. This should leave you in pretty good shape.

Remember, the healthier you stay in a survival situation, the better off everyone around you, (yourself included) will be. We owe it to ourselves to be at our best in a survival situation.

Until next time check out my other blog at:

http://www.therealamericanpolitics.blogspot.com

Groups

I said last time that I was going to describe my packs. Before I get into that, I would like to suggest that now is the time to possibly join a survival group, a patriot group or best of all a militia. Be sure that whatever club you join, that it is legal and a group that will look out for each other and the country. My suggestion would be to check out your area and find out if there is a militia group near you. Make sure that it is legal and not just a bunch of nuts that will get you arrested if anyone finds out about it. Patriot groups and survival groups are also excellent. The thing is that they should be trying to better this nation and their area and be willing to assist each other in a survival situation. If you can find nothing near you, try the Internet. Be careful as there are a lot of strange clubs that are listed under the heading of militia. I am involved with one of these sites and would recommend it to everyone. "The Well Regulated American Militias" is the title of the web site. http://militias.ning.com is the URL. There are groups to join on the web site and many states have militia groups on the site. Think about it, you may need a militia to survive.

Now to the promised pack contents. This week I will cover the food, which is enough for two people for fourteen days. Everything on this list was purchased in a supermarket. There are no freeze dried foods and no MRE's. The reason I did it this way is so that I could rotate my food in the packs by eating it and replacing it. As I started this process in January of 1989 and have had the packs ever since, you can see where even freeze dried food would go bad in that time. Most food companies will tell you that their food should not be kept over five years. I do not believe that it will go bad in that time, but after a while, even freeze dried food begins to deteriorate. Some of these items, such as the cold cereal, were bought in large boxes and split into individual portions. Anything that would not crush was vacuum sealed and things like cold cereal were put into zip-locks, expelling as much air as possible. Let us go on to the list.

Two people, fourteen days: breakfast: 10 individual pkts. instant oatmeal (flavored). These were repackaged into vacuum sealed bags. "Five days." ten individual pkts. of cold cereal (types that could be vacuum packed). "Five days." Four pkgs. toaster pops (in original packaging inside individual zip-locks). "Two days". Two pkgs pancake mis (add water only) (Repackaged into vacuum sealed bags). "Two days".

Lunch: Six pkgs. oriental noodles, (original pkgs). "Six days". Twelve individual pkts. cup-o-soup (original pkts.). "Six days". On other two days eat lunch from snack foods. Dinners: Three pkgs. Mac and cheese, (vacuum sealed). "Three days". four pkgs. Rice-a-Roni (vacuum seal) "Four days". Two cans luncheon meat (spam) (take out of can and vacuum seal it). One pound Velveeta cheese (vacuum) two pkgs. dried toast, two pkgs dried beef, one box instant potatoes. These items to be used to make dinners other seven days.

Snacks and drinks: Thirty sticks jerky, four lbs. dried fruit, eight granola bars, eight one ounce pkgs. raisins, forty-eight tea bags, ten one quart pkgs. instant milk, one jar bullion cubes, jar instant coffee, jar of Tang, one lb. margarine, one lb. sugar, salt and pepper. All items in jars and cans to be repackaged into vacuum sealed bags.

This was my total food supply for two people for two weeks. While it may seem kind of repetitive and not exactly gourmet food, remember it is for two weeks and it is to survive not to savor. This food was split into the two packs as equally as possible. That way if we got separated, we would both have enough to eat. I am going to leave it at this point this time. Next time I will get into what else to add to the packs. Until then check out my political blog at: http://www.theerealamericanpolitics.blogspot.com.