Medical when help is delayed

Plan for the hours before help arrives

In a grid-down emergency the hospitals may still be open, but getting there, and being seen, can take far longer than usual. The family's job is to handle the first hours: stop bleeding, keep someone stable until help comes, keep chronic conditions under control, and cut the risk of the stomach and skin infections that follow bad water and poor sanitation.

Nothing here replaces a doctor or real training. We point readers to in-person courses such as the American College of Surgeons' Stop the Bleed program and the Red Cross first aid classes, and we write the articles so they make sense after you have taken one.

What this section covers

Serious injuries

What goes in a kit for a deep cut or a crush injury, what a tourniquet and pressure bandage are for, and why training matters more than the gear.

Medications

Ready.gov notes that about half of Americans take a prescription every day (build a kit). We cover talking to your doctor about an emergency supply, storage temperatures, and what to do with refrigerated medicines when the power is out.

Power-dependent devices

Oxygen concentrators, CPAP machines and other equipment need a backup power plan made with the provider in advance.

Sanitation and hygiene

Clean water, hand washing, waste disposal and food safety matter more over a long emergency than any first aid pouch.

Older family members

Mobility, medications and heat or cold stress hit people over 65 hardest, so we give them their own articles.

Where to start

Take a course, build one kit for the house and one for each car, and ask your doctor how your household could keep a few extra weeks of each prescription. Write it all into your family plan.