PREVENTION OF SUFFOCATION AND CHOKING
Suffocation
• Don’t use a pillow with a very young baby (under a year), unless it is a specially made baby pillow that cannot suffocate the child.
• Keep polythene bags and record sleeves away from young children and babies.
• Take doors off disused refrigerators.
• Keep talcum powder away from babies and young children.
Choking
• Lay a baby on its side or facedown to sleep.
• Mash up food small or put it through a processor until the baby is really ready to cope with lumps.
• Discourage children from throwing sweets, peanuts, and so on, into the air and catching them in their mouths.
• Never let children run around eating-especially sweets.
• Keep beads, coins, buttons, boiled sweets, small toys and marbles away from young children and babies.
If a child (or an adult for that matter) does begin to choke, here’s what to do:
If a child begins to choke:
1. A very small baby can be held upside down and smacked on the back.
2. For an older child, lay him over your knee or over a chair and slap him hard on the back with the flat of your hand between the shoulder blades. This should dislodge the object and make him cough it up. If this doesn’t work at once, try the Heimlich method:
Get behind the child and place your arms around his or her waist.
Clench one of your hands into a fist over the child’s stomach between the navel and the rib cage.
Grip the clenched fist with the other hand.
Press your hands strongly against the abdominal wall, pressing slightly upwards. This sharp pressure drives the air out of the lungs suddenly and carries the obstructing object up through the windpipe.
If an adult begins to choke:
If you choke yourself it can be very difficult to explain what is wrong simply because you can’t speak. Point to your throat repeatedly-someone will soon get the message. If an adult choking on something is simply coughing and spluttering, slap him or her on the back if he or she wants help but otherwise leave the cough reflex to cope-it usually does. Get him or her to try to breathe slowly and deeply-this reduces the spasm of the windpipe and will release the choking object.
If the person is so obstructed that he or she is going blue:
1. Open the mouth to see if you can hook out the object with your finger. It is usually too far back for this but it is worth taking a quick look.
2. Get him or her on the floor, lying on the side.
3. Slap him or her firmly on the back between the shoulder blades. This will almost always dislodge the foreign body.
4 If this doesn’t work, use the Heimlich method.
If a fishbone sticks in the throat:
If the person is choking really seriously, treat as adult choking above.
It is often difficult to know whether or not you are really in trouble with a bone as fishbone often simply scratch the lining of the throat, giving an impression of being stuck there when in fact they are not. If all is well after an hour or two, the chances are that it was simply a scratch. If things seem to be getting worse, go to hospital so that a doctor can look down your throat.
Do not try to reach into the throat to pick the bone out. Do not give cotton wool sandwiches or other bulky remedies to swallow. Neither of these procedures works.
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