
Cyling First Aid Kits – A Complete Guide
Whether you’re scaling a mountain or making your way to work, you’re never immune to an accident on your bike. As a cyclist, it’s something you should always be prepared for, and if you’re a seasoned bike rider, you likely know that a crash here and there is inevitable.
No matter where you are when you get into an accident on your bike, the earlier you can treat injuries, the better chance you have of recovering quickly and getting back to what you enjoy.
Take care of yourself with a bike first aid kit. A cycling first aid kit can be tiny, compact, and lightweight. Attach it to your bike or keep it in your bag and you might forget it’s there entirely—until you need it, and that’s when you’ll be happy you came prepared.
Cycling First Aid Kit Essentials
If you’re planning to put together your own DIY bike first aid kit, you have the freedom to customise your kit however you want or need. But there are a few essentials that should be included in every first aid kit.
Plasters
If you’re lucky, your cycling injury might only need to be treated with the application of a plaster. When you cut or graze yourself on the open road (or off-road), your open wound is at risk of infection. A plaster provides a barrier that protects your wound from harmful bacteria or knocks that could cause the injury to get worse.
Plasters also keep your wound wet, something that is conducive to the healing process and reduces the likelihood of scab-cracking and reinfection.
Waterproof plasters are ideal, providing a sealed-in environment for your wound and a barrier against the elements outside.
Alcohol-Free Disinfecting Wipes
Disinfecting wipes are another absolute essential of any first aid bike kit. Putting a plaster or dressing on a dirty wound will only trap bacteria against it and can push debris further into the wound, making infection much more likely.
Cleaning a wound is essential before dressing it, so packing some disinfecting wipes in your kit is highly important. Alcohol used for medical disinfecting has been found to actually inhibit the healing process. This study on the factors affecting wound healing found that alcohol caused dehydration of the area and affected collagen production. It also inhibited the important inflammatory response.
Choosing alcohol-free wipes ensures you can clean your wound in an effective and thorough but gentle way, helping your body get on with the natural healing process.
Microporous Tape
When a little more than a plaster is needed and you’re dressing a wound, you need to securely fasten it to your body. Not only should your wound be completely protected, but if you have several miles to cycle back to civilisation, you need to know you can do it without losing your dressing in the wind.
Microporous Tape is easy to tear by hand, securely holds dressings in place, and removes painlessly.
Absorbent Wound Dressing
For wounds that are more problematic or more severe, an absorbent wound dressing can come in handy. These are highly absorbent sterile pads that can be used to apply pressure to a wound and dress it. The density of the dressing allows it to absorb exudate from a wound and, at the same time, provides padding that absorbs impacts which could cause more pain and trauma.
Our NHS-approved absorbent wound dressings are double-sided, making them simpler to use in an emergency and are low-level adherent making dressing much easier.
Disposable Gloves
It goes without saying that when cleaning a wound, you need to have clean hands. But what if you’re not very close to proper hand-washing facilities, as you may well find yourself when faced with a cycling injury. Putting on disposable gloves means you can clean and treat a wound without needing to worry about washing your hands.
Disposable gloves are also important if you’re treating another person. If you will be touching someone else’s bodily fluids, it’s important to wear a barrier to protect yourself, especially if you’ll be touching sharp objects as well.
Our nitrile gloves are graze and puncture-proof (and the first choice for many surgeons), which gives you added protection.
Eye and Wound Wash Solution
Eye and wound wash solution in 20ml ampoules takes up no space at all but can be used to hygienically clean anything: eyes, wounds, even hands. The gentle saline solution is formulated to mimic human tears and blood to make it non-irritating when absorbed by the body.
Using wound wash to clean a wound, followed by an alcohol-free disinfectant wipe, is the most thorough way to clean a wound, even just at home. The precision pods that our eye and wound wash come in can be used to clean even difficult to reach areas. They’re great for a quick, efficient eyewash if a foreign object flies into your eye on the road.
Adhesive Wound Dressing
An adhesive wound dressing acts as a kind of plaster for more acute injuries, consisting of a highly absorbent pad that will not stick to an injury, covered by a flexible, stretchy, non-woven adhesive material. The adhesive wound dressing will allow you to keep a wound moist or dry and protect it from the elements until you can be seen by a professional.
Whether to let a wound air dry or keep it moist has been a topic of debate among cyclists for a while. Research suggests that the moist environment allows epidermal cells more freedom of movement across the wound in order to close and heal it more quickly. This can even reduce scarring.
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