Introduction to Basic First Aid

Lessons

Senior 6 · Physical Education

Introduction to Basic First Aid

4 lessons

Lesson 1 of 4

First aid in sport: meaning, aims and the first steps

25 min

The first minutes decide

On 12 June 2021, Denmark's Christian Eriksen collapsed on the pitch during a Euro 2020 match in Copenhagen. His heart had stopped. Team-mates and medical staff reached him within seconds, and he was given chest compressions and a shock from a defibrillator on the pitch. He survived and later returned to international football. Most sports injuries are far less serious, a twisted ankle, a cut knee, a bang on the head, but the lesson is the same: what the people nearby do in the first minutes, before an ambulance arrives, can decide how well, and sometimes whether, an injured player recovers. This unit teaches the first aid a PE leader, coach or team-mate should know, following the European Resuscitation Council (ERC) Guidelines 2025 and the International Liaison Committee on Resuscitation (ILCOR).

Definition

First aid: the helping behaviour and first care given by anyone to a person with a sudden illness or injury, including recognising the problem, giving care within one's training and calling for further help (ERC 2025).

First aider: the person giving first aid. Casualty: the person who is ill or injured.

Emergency medical services: the trained ambulance service. In Rwanda this is SAMU, reached free of charge on 912.

Consent: the casualty's permission to be helped. A responsive person may refuse; an unresponsive person is treated as if they would agree.

Responsiveness: how well a person reacts to voice and touch, from fully alert to unresponsive.

Why first aid matters in sport

First aid manuals often sum up its aims as the three Ps: preserve life, prevent the condition from getting worse, and promote recovery. In sport this means:

Saving life in rare but deadly emergencies: cardiac arrest, choking, severe bleeding, heat stroke and serious head or neck injury.
Limiting damage in common injuries: stopping play, protecting a sprained joint or a broken bone, and cleaning and covering wounds.
Safe decisions about play: a player with a suspected concussion must be removed from activity and assessed by a health professional, not sent back on.
Confidence and responsibility: the ERC says first aiders should act within their training and know their limits; for some, the only step is to call the emergency number, and that call is first aid too.

The first aider's first steps

Calling 912. Call early, or send someone to call, then switch the phone to speaker so your hands are free. Tell the call-taker where you are (school, district, nearest landmark), what happened, how many people are hurt and how they are, and your phone number. Answer every question and do not hang up until you are told to: the call-taker will tell you what to do while the ambulance is on its way.

Protect yourself and the casualty. Wear disposable gloves when touching blood or body fluids, wash your hands after care, and never give a casualty with a serious injury anything to eat or drink.

A first aid kit for school sport

Item	Used for
Disposable gloves (several pairs)	Protecting first aider and casualty from infection
Sterile gauze dressings and adhesive plasters	Covering wounds and pressing on bleeding
Roller and triangular bandages	Holding dressings in place; supporting an injured arm in a sling
Instant cold packs (or a clean bag for ice and water)	Cooling bruises and sprains, always wrapped in cloth
Clean water, foil blanket, scissors, notebook and pen	Rinsing wounds, keeping a casualty warm, recording what happened and when
A charged phone and the address of the venue	Calling 912 and directing the ambulance

The ERC asks that first aid kits be clearly marked, easy to reach, suited to the risks of the setting, and checked regularly so that used or out-of-date items are replaced.

Worked example

Worked example 1: following the order. During a football match, two players clash heads. One gets up holding his forehead; the other lies still on the grass. What does the PE leader do, in order?

Safety: stop the game so no one runs into the injured players.
Response: kneel by the player on the ground, gently tap her shoulder and ask loudly, "Are you OK?" She groans and opens her eyes: she is responsive.
Bleeding: none that is life-threatening.
Airway and breathing: she is talking, so her airway is open and she is breathing. Because of the collision, tell her not to move her neck.
Disability: she is confused about the score: suspected concussion. She does not return to the game and is checked by a health worker; 912 is called if she gets worse. The player who got up is checked for the same signs before anyone decides whether he may play on.

Worked example

Worked example 2: a clear 912 call. A model call for a pupil who has collapsed during a cross-country race:

"I need an ambulance. A 17-year-old boy has collapsed during a race and is not responding."
"We are at the sports ground behind the secondary school, on the main road next to the health centre." (Location first and clearly: the call-taker may need it twice.)
"He is breathing" or "He is not breathing normally." (The call-taker uses this to decide whether you must start CPR.)
"My number is …" Then stay on the line with the speaker on and do exactly what you are told.

Video: "How to do the Primary Survey - First Aid Training - St John Ambulance", St John Ambulance. A UK trainer shows how to check danger, response, airway and breathing. The video gives the UK emergency numbers: in Rwanda, call 912.

Tip

Before every PE lesson or match, check three things: where the first aid kit is, whether a phone has signal and credit, and the exact address to give to 912. An emergency is the wrong time to find out.

Warning

Safety. Never put yourself in danger to help: a casualty on a road or near a hazard is helped only when the danger is controlled. Do not move a person who may have a head or neck injury unless they are in danger where they lie. Give only the care you have been trained to give, and never send a player with a suspected concussion back to play.

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Practice

Define first aid in your own words.
State the three aims of first aid.
What number do you call for an ambulance in Rwanda, and which service answers it?
Put these in the correct order: Breathing, Safety, Airway, Response, Life-threatening bleeding.
List four things you should tell the call-taker.
Why should a first aider wear gloves when treating a bleeding wound?
A player is lying on the track after a fall. List what you would check in the first minute, in order.
A team captain says, "I'm not trained, so I'll just leave it to the teacher." Evaluate this view, using what the ERC says about calling for help.

Show answersHide answers

The first help and care given by anyone to a person with a sudden illness or injury, until professional help takes over.
Preserve life, prevent the condition from getting worse, promote recovery.
912; SAMU, the emergency medical service of the Rwanda Biomedical Centre.
Safety, Response, Life-threatening bleeding, Airway, Breathing.
Any four: the exact location; what happened; how many casualties; whether they are responsive and breathing normally; your phone number.
To protect both the first aider and the casualty from infections carried in blood.
Safety of the scene; response (shoulders, "Are you OK?"); any life-threatening bleeding; airway (and possible neck injury after a fall); breathing, for up to 10 seconds; then circulation, disability (ACVPU) and the rest of the body.
Partly wrong. Anyone can give first aid: calling 912, fetching the kit or an AED, or keeping others back are all first aid, and the ERC notes that for some first aiders the only step is to call for help. The captain should act within their ability, not stand back.

Remember

First aid: help and early care by anyone, within their training, until professionals take over.
Aims: preserve life, prevent worsening, promote recovery.
Order: Safety, Response, life-threatening Bleeding, Airway, Breathing, Circulation, Disability, Exposure.
Rwanda's ambulance number: 912 (SAMU). Speaker on, stay on the line.
Gloves, clean hands and a stocked, checked kit.

Sources and credits

European Resuscitation Council Guidelines 2025: First Aid, Djärv T and others, Resuscitation 215 (2025) 110752: definition of first aid, the ABCDE assessment (Table 3), first aid kits; summarised, not copied.
SAMU Services, Rwanda Biomedical Centre: the 912 emergency line.
Christian Eriksen, Wikipedia contributors, Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Adapted by Ganzaa.
Photo: First Aid Kit for Immediate Emergency Response 01, ABORISADEADETONA, Wikimedia Commons, CC0.
Video: "How to do the Primary Survey - First Aid Training - St John Ambulance", St John Ambulance, embedded from YouTube.
Assessment chart, kit table, worked examples and practice: written by Ganzaa.

This lesson adapts CC BY-SA material and is shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.

1The first minutes decide

2Why first aid matters in sport

3The first aider's first steps

4A first aid kit for school sport

The first minutes decide

Why first aid matters in sport

The first aider's first steps

A first aid kit for school sport