Mindsmart 2019 workshop on safety

Every single person in the world has the capacity to save a life it is an essential gesture of solidarity. First aid education should be accessible to all without discrimination. -Grace Lo

The fourth and the last of the four series of Mindsmart 2019 workshops aimed at providing training on the topics, behavioural and emotional safety at school, first aid and a CPR training to all peer educators of the participating schools. The workshop was orgainsed by Expressions India on 8 August 2019 at the auditorium of the National Science Centre.

Shaumita Dasgupta, Manas Mukhija from IX-B, Damak Saxena and Shardha from IX-D took part in the event. The chief guests of the day were Prof. (Mrs.) Saroj Yadav- Head of Department-Education of Social Sciences and Humanities (DESSH), Dr. Harmeet Singh - consultant and head emergency and urgent care at Moolchand Medicity, Ms. Rekha Chuahan-renowned counseling psychologist and Dr. Jitendra Nagpal, Director of Expressions India.

The workshop had two sessions. In the first session, Prof. Yadav discussed the importance of life skills as psycho social skills. She mentioned the role of the Ayushman Bharat scheme in taking care of the two major elements health and wellness. Students were convinced with the concepts she shared which were: role of life skills and relations in taking care of the above two elements. She concluded her short session by talking about the role of identity formation during adolescence. She urged the students to introspect to find answers to three questions- what I am?, what I have? and what can I do?

The second session was conducted by Dr. Singh and he covered the topic first aid and CPR ( Cardiac Pulmonary Resuscitation). He began the session by enabling everyone to understand the importance and need to have an emergency kit, list of emergency help phone numbers and a fire extinguisher at home as these are basic equipments required in need. Then he explained the difference between cardiac arrest and heart attack. He also shared the typical and atypical symptoms of a heart attack and the need to consult an expert on observing any of these signs in an individual. In the next part of his session, he demonstrated the steps of adult CPR including individually training the peer educators, using human dummies.

After this he spoke on the topic of choking of the wind pipe in humans due to an interruption caused by a foreign object in the air passage. He used a video to clear the concept and showed various situations like choking while eating in the case of pregnant women etc. He spoke about the identification of the need for first aid and medical support where a person suffers a brain stroke. He clarified the concept of brain hemorrhage leading to a brain stroke. After this he shared the symptoms of identification which can be recalled with the help of mnemonic FAST (Facial deviation, Arm drift, Slurring of speech and Time of seeking medical support).

Before seeking feedback and clarifying doubts of the audience Dr. Singh revised the three concepts he had shared for three common situations. He referred to videos made by him and available on YouTube on these subjects. He mentioned that around 40 lakh patients fail to recover from accident injuries on account of a lack of first aid given!

The series of workshops culminated with a convocation ceremony in which Dr. Nagpal and Ms. Chauhan shared their experience and thr need for such workshops for school students. The Peer educators expressed their appreciation for being selected for the workshops as they collected their citations and certificates of honour.