First Aid and
Your Workspace
Mental Health
First Aid
What First
Aid Content
Do Your
Employees
Need?
A New
Standard for
Workplace
Injury
Reduction
ADVERTORIAL
Mental health issues affect everyone in the workplace. Making sure your employees can support
those experiencing mental health issues in a compassionate and effective way will help alleviate
misconceptions and reduce the stigma around mental illness.
With the support of Bell Let’s Talk, Canadian Red Cross will add Mental Health First Aid content to our
programs in 2017. This fall, our First Aid App will carry strategies and tools to help those supporting people
with a mental health crisis. We encourage you to start a dialogue around mental health in your workplace.
Guidelines affecting first aid and resuscitation are changing. To support first aid education in the
workplace, the lead training agencies in Canada have built a consensus around the guidelines for
Canada. These can be found at redcross.ca/firstaidguidelines.
Using evidence-based practice can in fact help us save more lives. As our global understanding of clinical
and educational science continues to evolve, we can use the latest science to update our practices for
better outcomes for persons in need of care.
The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) just released international
guidelines for 2016, which reflect the latest in evidence-based science on how to reduce suffering and
save lives. The Canadian Red Cross will develop more comprehensive educational techniques as training
is more than the direct interventions applied in an emergency; how we engage our learners is also a critical
component.
There is an exciting new initiative spearheaded by the Canadian Red Cross, Canadian Standards
Association (CSA), and the Workplace Injury Reduction Collaborative (made up of provincial
worker safety regulators, labour groups, and other training agencies) that will build a competency
framework for workplace first aid training.
Human resource professionals who have employees in more than one province can attest to the differences
in first aid training requirements based on legislation. It is very tricky to ensure that all employees meet
legislation requirements and also have the same level of safety training across Canada.
The CSA is working with the Collaborative and a working committee to support the development of a
standard for workplace first aid in Canada. More on this initiative—due in the spring of 2017—can be found
on the CSA website csagroup.org.
For the employees who have smartphones or tablets, here is a tool to make first aid training part of their
life. The app helps people learn or refresh skills, can be a quick reference for emergency situations, and
provides mini tests to validate knowledge. Obtaining one or more of the badges (which can also be shared
on social media) can be a weekly goal to help keep health and safety education top of mind.
Download our Free First Aid App from Google Play, iTunes or redcross.ca/apps.
Free
First Aid
App
Red Cross First Aid. The Experience to Make a Difference. 1.877.356.3226
redcross.ca/firstaid
redcross.ca/catalogue
redcross.ca/apps