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First Aid Kit?

01.10.2010 by Ray Niekamp // 15 Comments

Recently, I was riding at the local Veloway when I caught up to a family out for a spin. A father, mother, and their grade-school daughter were riding easily along, but the little girl wasn’t very steady on the bike. She weaved back and forth across the track, but seemed to keep her bike more or less under control — until she hit a rock.

The front wheel turned sharply, and she was catapulted from the bike onto the hard surface. She wore a helmet, but that didn’t keep her from scraping her face on the asphalt. Her parents jumped to help her. I asked if I could do anything, but the dad said since we were near the parking lot, they would just head back there and take her home.

I thought about the crash, and about some that I’ve seen, and been involved in myself. After my last crash, I had some severe road rash, but still had four uncomfortable miles to pedal home before I could treat it. I wonder — should we be carrying first aid kits in our seat bags?

That’s something I’ve never discussed with the folks I usually ride with. I know there are commercially-packaged kits, like the one in the picture, that would probably do the job admirably. This one is by Skinz, and seems to cover all the bases. It contains:

2- Sterile 3×3 Dressing (pkg 2)
3-1×3 band aids
2- Knuckle band aids
1-1/2” x 10yd tape
1-sting relief pad
1-APAP extra strength pkg of 2 (like Tylenol)
1- Mole skin(for blisters)
3-antiseptic towelette’s
1-antibiotic ointment

The downside is, kits like this cost $25-$30. We might not need as much as this one has, but if you were going to put together some kind of first aid kit for your seatbag, what would it contain? Or are these another unnecessary addition to our loads?

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Categories // Injury, Safety Tags // first aid, Injury, Safety

Road Rash

11.17.2009 by Ray Niekamp // 1 Comment

Road rash (not mine).

After my crash a week and a half ago, I noticed that the road rash on my hip was taking awhile to heal. The abrasion took off just the very surface of the skin, but it was slow in scabbing over. The fact that I treated it like a “guy” probably didn’t help, either. Oh, I washed it with soap right away, and applied NeoSporin — but because it covered a somewhat wide area, I decided not to cover the wound. I’d let it get some air. It would heal quicker that way, anyway.

Problem was, I didn’t think about nighttime. When I woke up in the morning, getting out of bed was a bit painful, because the road rash stuck to the bedsheet. And pulling my leg off the sheet opened the already weeping sore spot.

This went on for several days, until my wife snapped at me about the mess I’d left on the sheet. So I poked around the medicine cabinet, and came up with some stuff that makes a liquid bandage on the skin. I put it on, and it actually worked. The wound scabbed over, and the scab stayed.

It turns out that letting the wound scab over was the “old fashioned” way to treat it. Nowadays, they say I should have cleaned the wound, continued to put NeoSporin or something like it over the sore, and cover it with some kind of bandage, like a non-stick gauze pad. And repeat every day. Once a wound scabs over, it’s harder for oxygen to reach it, and the no-cover method could result in a longer healing time. That’s just what happened. The smaller abrasions around my knee scabbed with no trouble. But the scabs are quite thick, and they’ve become a bit painful.

I’m on track, though. Now that the weeping has stopped, the wound should heal in another week to 10 days. It’s still sore when I touch it (“Then don’t touch it!” — bah-dang!) but it’s smaller than it was.

Well, I’m a little smarter, anyway. Next time I go down (Oh, there will be a next time — I’m realistic about my riding ability) I’ll be more aggressive in treating the road rash. But as a friend of mine likes to say, “Bikers get the coolest scars.”

For more detailed info on road rash, download the free publication from cycling coach Arnie Baker:

Above photo used under Creative Commons license.


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Categories // Injury Tags // Injury, road rash

Vertigo — Part 2

10.26.2009 by Ray Niekamp // 1 Comment

Guest poster Don Blount continues the story of his recent crash — and its unexpected side effect.

BlountOnBikingI awoke early Saturday, I think it was about 4 a.m., feeling woozy. The bedroom was dark, except for the glow of a smoke detector indicator light on the ceiling. The only problem was that the light was not stationary. It seemed to be zipping clockwise around the room.

I was sweating and nauseous. I staggered a few feet to the bathroom, splashed water on my face and the dizziness went away. I made it back to bed.

Two hours later I was awakened by the same sensation. This time I stumbled to the bathroom and held on to the basin for dear life until the room stopped spinning.

I also hurled. I would do so another nine times that day.

I tried to eat some broth and some crackers but nothing stayed down.

I spent that portion of the day face down on the floor with a bucket next to me.

I remember hearing Bob Griese, Chris Spielman and another broadcaster announcing the Michigan State-Wisconsin game (Michigan State lost). I didn’t have the strength to change the channel. I heard carpet cleaners come and go, and I didn’t want to move for fear of another episode starting.

My wife was on the phone with an advice nurse. Initially it was thought I had some type of head injury from my fall days earlier. It can take up to two weeks for symptoms to develop from a head injury. But when told that every time I moved I got dizzy, the nurse surmised that I could have vertigo.

Vertigo isn’t just an inner ear problem that causes dizziness and imbalance. It can be brought on by a head injury – that was the concern with me. It can also happen for no specific cause in what is known as spontaneous vertigo.

My wife was able to get a 1:45 p.m. appointment at an after hours clinic with our health care provider. She dropped the kids off at friends and came back for me. As we drove to the office, I told her about various bill due dates and passwords she would need. At that point I thought I might have had some type of head injury and may end up unconscious or sedated. She was trying not to cry.

The doctor had me describe my symptoms and do certain balance tests, such as stand on one foot and touch my nose with my eyes closed. I wasn’t drunk, just sick. It wasn’t until I hurled in front of him like Mr. Creosote, the glutton who eats too much and blows up in Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life that he had his “Ah Ha” moment.

“I’m going to give you something for the nausea,” he said.

“Thank goodness,” I mumbled to myself.

I received that shot – in the butt, not the arm – at about 3:15 p.m. I was still dizzy but at least I wasn’t queasy. I was sent to the emergency room at another hospital for tests.

We sat in the emergency room for one hour and 40 minutes. A repeat of America’s Funniest Home Videos was airing. I just sat there with my head in my hands, asking my wife every few minutes how long we had been there.

They performed a cat scan and various blood tests but found nothing abnormal.

MezI was given meclizine, a drug used for motion sickness and dizziness.

I was battered but well enough to go home. We left sometime after 8 p.m.

I could function but was far from healed.

The symptoms went away in stages over the next few weeks. I couldn’t tilt my head back or move quickly and I had to sleep propped up too.

Don's new helmet.
Don's new helmet.

It kept me off the bike for nearly a week. I got back on the rollers first and after that went well, was able to convince my doctors to take off the cast and let me wear a soft support — my wrist was still fractured after all. A soft support I could ride with, a cast not easily. I took my bike out on the road the following day.

Don continues to monitor himself for any return of vertigo, which the doctors now say was completely spontaneous. But it can linger.

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Categories // guest post, Injury Tags // Blount, guest post, Injury, vertigo

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