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Example Case Studies

Case Study 1

An accountancy company have 25 employees in an office. Manual work is limited to employees lifting small boxes. The hours of work are 9 to 5.

Having considered the possible illness and injuries that could occur, the company decided to provide EFAW (6 hour) training for their first aiders. To ensure that cover was provided at all times the company trained 2 emergency first aiders. The holiday rota system was adjusted so that only one first aider could book annual leave at a time.

Case Study 2

A school has a total of 40 teaching staff and pupils aged from 11 - 18yrs. The staff are all young, fit and healthy.  Some of the children suffer from asthma and staff regularly takes groups of children away on field trips.

To fulfil their first aid at work obligations the school decides to train 3 members of staff with EFAW to ensure cover at all times. The schools is very conscientious and understands that they have a duty of care to all their children and also any visiting adultsso they decide to run a basic first aid course on their next whole school inset day to ensure that everyone has the essential life saving first aid skills and knows how to manage illness.  They also send a couple of the geography teachers away on a specialist Outdoor First Aid training course.  Specialist courses outside the field of First Aid at Work are not regulated by the HSE.

Case Study 3

A retail store identified different areas of risk in different areas of the workplace. The company identified that the office area only required EFAW first aiders, but reviewing the accident records they identified that slips and trips had occurred in the store and a customer suffered a severe asthma attack last year.

The  company felt that they assumed a duty of care when customers were on their premises so they decided to provide FAW (18 hour) training for their first aiders. This ensured that the first aiders were trained to deal with the possible injuries and illness that could occur in the store and also provided adequate cover for the office. To cover shifts and foreseeable absences, the company decided to train 3 first aiders on each shift.

Case Study 4

A call centre employs 450 staff in a 10 storey office building.

Health & Safety Executive advice recommends 1 FAW first aider per 100 employees (or part thereof) in a low hazard workplace, which required at least 5 first aiders on duty at all times.

The company decided to train 1 first aider on each floor (10 in total) which ensured that cover was available for foreseeable absences and the first aiders would be distributed evenly throughout the building should an incident occur.

The same call centre expanded and employed a further 250 employees to work on an evening shift in the same building. An extra 5 first aiders were trained to cover this shift, they are spread over several floors but are in close proximity to where people work.

Case Study 5

An electrical contracting company have a team of 20 electricians who work mainly on building sites, but sometimes they work for domestic clients. The electricians work in pairs. When the electricians work on building sites, the main building contractor always assumes responsibility for first aid provision and this is documented in writing.

The company decided that due to the risk of electrical shock, electrical burns, slips, trips and manual handling injuries they would provide full FAW training for all staff. This ensured that they could send any electrician to any job without pre-arranging that first aid cover would be provided by the customer. The company provided a first aid kit in each company van and all the staff had access to a mobile phone which ensured that they would be able to call emergency services wherever they were working.