If you’re a manager or safety officer in your organisation, you may be responsible for creating an Emergency Response Plan. This plan exists to inform and guide employees on how to deal with emergencies and incidents, including medical emergencies.
Having an Emergency Response Plan can help you save lives and minimise risk, but it can also serve to protect the business from potential liabilities.
Keep reading to discover the role First Aid and CPR training plays in creating your Emergency Response Plan.
Step one: conduct a First Aid Risk Assessment
Conducting a First Aid Risk Assessment is an important first step to get an accurate overview of that needs to be implemented for the organisation to remain compliant.
One of these considerations is the legal requirement of providing First Aid kits, which must be appropriate to the level of risk.
For higher risk workplaces, more First Aid kits must be provided in more locations (for example, multiple kits for multiple building levels). Additionally, each kit must contain the right supplies for the work environment’s level of risk, and this is determined based on the first aid risk assessment.
The other important consideration is the legal number of First Aiders required on site to remain compliant. High risk workplaces require more First Aiders than low risk workplaces, and failure to achieve this can put your business at risk of a penalty of up to $3M. So, it pays to do your risk assessment properly!
Step two: establish an Emergency Response Team
The second step is to establish key, qualified people who will take on emergency response roles. Your Emergency Response Team should at minimum, consist of the following people:
- Incident Commander – this person oversees the response and makes key decisions (in a smaller business, this would be the business owner or manager).
- Safety Officer – this is the person who ensures actions are carried out safely and without risk in an emergency.
- Communication Lead – this person is responsible for coordinating internal and external communications during an emergency.
- First Aid Officer – this person’s job is to provide medical assistance to injured people, as well as maintain First Aid kits and defibrillator batteries on site. It’s important to ensure you have at least 1 – 2 First Aid Officers on site to lead during medical emergencies.
(While trained First Aiders can assist with proving first aid, keep in mind that they do not have the extended maintenance responsibilities that ensures business compliance and reduces risk of liability if an incident occurs.)
Step three: define and communicate emergency procedures
As part of your Emergency Response Plan, a number of emergency procedures (e.g. evaluation procedures, lockdown procedures, etc.) will need to be created, and one of these procedures is a Medical Emergency Procedure.
Your Medical Emergency Procedure should include the following information:
- First Aid response – information on how to provide immediate assistance until first responders arrive.
- Emergency numbers – emergency contact details (e.g. Triple Zero).
- DRSABCD action plan – how to respond quickly to an emergency.
- AED Defibrillator use and maintenance– information on how to use an Automated External Defibrillator (AED).
If you don’t have this documentation in place, somebody who has undergone First Aid and CPR Training within your organisation will be able to assist you in putting this together.
As part of this plan, you should also ensure the contact details of your Emergency Response Team are included, so that key personnel can be contacted quickly if an incident occurs.
Step four: train employees in First Aid and CPR
Regular training should be provided as part of your Emergency Response Plan, including evacuation and lockdown drills.
Additionally, workplace First Aid requirements indicate that opportunities for First Aiders to renew their training should be organised and offered multiple times per year. If you have nominated First Aiders in your workplace, they need to regularly attend training to ensure currency and compliance.
Even though HLTAID011 Provide First Aid and CPR only requires renewal every three (3) years, HLTAID009 Provide CPR only must be renewed annually (every 12 months), making annual refresher courses essential.
Because of this, we recommend organising 2 – 4 corporate group bookings for your organisation per year. These can be completed in a single day (or half a day for CPR refresher training– great for Personal Development days if you’re a school organisation), and we’ll even come to you!
This ensures that newcomers have the opportunity to get trained, and that nominated First Aiders are renewing their training within a 12-month window.
(Note: This is especially important in community sectors if you have large quantities of staff—such as support workers—who require mandatory First Aid and CPR certification. The moment their certification expires, they become non-compliant if they continue to work shifts and pose a huge risk to your business.
We highly recommend having regular First Aid and CPR Training sessions booked for this reason to ensure no certifications lapse—the expiry dates sneak up faster than you might think!)
Keep your staff’s First Aid training up to date
If you’re ready to book First Aid for your team, organise a corporate or group booking.
This cost-effective solution minimises any accessibility hurdles for employees and ensures each workplace is prepared for an emergency, with skills that can help save a life.