Bleed control kits being rolled out across Liverpool secondary schools
A specialist trauma surgeon says they will save lives
Last updated 16th Oct 2023
Bleed control kits are going to be rolled out to all secondary schools in the Liverpool City Region.
Funding from the LFC Foundation has been secured via our charity Cash For Kids to make this happen.
Knifesavers is a not-for-profit programme founded in 2019 to empower and educate the public to deal with any cause of major bleeding.
There are currently around 1600 bleeding control packs across the North West, with cabinets going up across the region soon as well.
The kits are accessed by calling 999 and explaining the emergency and where you are - you will then be told how to access the cabinet with a code.
The kits have:
- Gloves
- Celox
- Trauma dressing
- Tourniquet
- Guidance on how to use the kits to control major bleeding
Nikhil Misra, Consultant General and Trauma Surgeon at Aintree University Hospital, said:
"What we've seen unfortunately time and time again in the trauma hospitals across the region is that a single knife wound has caused a loss of life.
"We do have some anecdotal evidence from speaking to young people, from speaking to youth workers across the city, that actually there isn't that knowledge of what a single knife wound can do in terms of the consequences of that. It's not just a wound.
"We want to get into the minds of young people"
"We want to get into the minds of young people to tell them, to train them, to teach them - it's like a stopwatch that starts and that second hand keeps going as soon as someone injured and why we have to act so quickly.
"(It takes around) four to five minutes after an uncontrolled blood loss until the heart starts to weaken.
Mr. Misra adds that the kits are proven to work.
"There were two young lads who had a knife injury in a school in Runcorn a couple of years ago, there were two incidents from the Constabulary in Cheshire and also from Liverpool City Centre.
"These are just the ones we know about and then we heard anecdotal evidence from people who reach out to us and say 'I went on your training session, I've used your techniques and your education and I stopped someone bleeding'. That is what its all about.
"One of the young people who came on our training a few months ago, wrote back to us and said 'I used your Knifesavers education when a chap, when I was buying some chips, fell outside the chip shop and hurt his heard, quite profound bleeding, no-one knew what to do, but I did.'
"We're very proud of that and very proud of him for doing that.
"That patient came to us in the trauma centre and had quite an extensive head injury. We did some surgery and he got better and went home."
There have been many campaigns launched to get more accessible bleed control kits in public places across Merseyside.
Laura Hughes has long been campaigning for kits to be rolled out after her brother Colin McGinty was fatally stabbed at the age of 21 in Bootle in 2001.
She said:
"I'm absolutely delighted (at news of the kits being rolled out across secondary schools in the Liverpool City Region). This is one of many projects that we're working on at the moment and our end objective is to educate young people on what to do in an emergency situation when someone's losing too much blood.
"To have these Knifesavers kits put right across secondary schools is absolutely fantastic. It's perfect for what we want to achieve.
"You could lose too much blood from just one single stab wound and we know that victims of these crimes are getting younger.
"An extension of your first aid kit"
"To have them in a secondary school or in a setting where there are young people socialising, it's an absolute no-brainer.
"I see this as well if you've got a first aid kit, this is an extension of your first aid kit. Hopefully it'll never be used, but it's there in case it does need to be used."