I hope this course has given you some tools as well as food for thought when it comes to avoid falls, falling and minor injury treatment. Most of it will seem like common sense I know. I know everyone has fallen but I hope that we can avoid falling in the future. That’s a lot to ask. I actually slipped and fell the other day, before this course was even complete! A group of us go to medical qigong training in PA several times a year and where we train is at the top of a mountain. The road leading up the mountain is narrow and apparently very slippery at times in the winter. One of our classmates was driving the vehicle ahead of us and he got stuck. His wheels just kept spinning but he could no longer ascend the slope. When we stopped to help him, we also got stuck as our momentum was gone. After some pushing I was able to get our vehicle unstuck and I went up to get our teacher. Luckily one of the fellow students behind us had a vehicle that was able to handle these conditions, so we rode back down with her to help get the other vehicles. Five of us were able to push him far enough up the winding slope in the freezing cold far enough that he finally caught traction and made it up to the top. As we were walking I slipped on a patch of ice so suddenly that there was no time to reach out and slap the ground as we described in the breakfall lessons. I did however manage to turn slightly landing on my arm and shoulder pulling my knees up slightly and tucking my chin to keep my head from hitting the ground. My teacher looked down on me and smiled he said “Breakfall huh? good.”
The big key points that I would like for everyone to take away are:
- Building awareness and balance for fall prevention
- Protect the head in case you do go down
- Serious injuries get help don’t move
- minor sprains and strains use the R.I.C.E. method