Improvised First Aid With What’s in Your Car

The first aid kit is always in the other car. What you actually have at a roadside incident is a vehicle full of ordinary objects, a phone, and whatever you are wearing — and that is more capable than it sounds.

This is not an argument against carrying a kit. It is what to do in the ninety percent of cases where you do not have one, and it works because the small number of things that matter in the first ten minutes need pressure, insulation, immobilisation and a phone call, not equipment.

The emergency numbers below are Australian. Elsewhere, call your own — 911 in the United States and Canada, 999 in the United Kingdom, 112 across Europe, and 112 works on most mobile phones worldwide, including with no SIM.

The 10-minute version

1. Call 000 first, on speaker. The operator will talk you through it and the ambulance starts moving while you work. Do not wait until you have assessed everything.
2. Bleeding is the improvisable emergency. Anything clean and absorbent plus firm hand pressure works. Your hand is the tool; the cloth is a detail.
3. Do not improvise a tourniquet from a belt or a shoelace, and do not improvise splinting a suspected spinal injury. Those two do more harm than good.

What a car already contains

Object	Use
Clean T-shirt, jumper, towel	Bleeding control, padding, burn covering
Seatbelt or webbing strap	Broad immobilisation of an arm against the body
Headrest, jumper, jacket	Padding either side of a head or limb to prevent movement
Floor mat, magazine, cardboard	A rigid splint for a forearm or lower leg
Bottled water	Cooling a burn, flushing an eye, rinsing a wound
Phone	000, torch, Emergency+ app for coordinates, speaker mode
Hazard triangle, hi-vis vest, hazard lights	Scene safety, which is the first job
Picnic blanket, spare clothes	Preventing hypothermia, which sets in fast in a shocked patient
Plastic bag or cling film	Covering a burn without sticking
Umbrella, jumper leads, tent pole	Rigid splint material
Sanitiser, wet wipes	Hand hygiene before touching a wound
Ice from an esky	Never directly on a burn or skin. Wrapped, for a soft tissue injury only

The sequence at a roadside incident

1. Make the scene safe. More rescuers are injured at roadside incidents than most people imagine. Hazard lights, park well back, hi-vis if you have it, triangle out, and consider oncoming traffic before you consider the patient. If you become a second casualty you have made things worse.

2. Call 000 on speaker. Give the location — the Emergency+ app displays your coordinates and is worth installing tonight. Stay on the line.

3. Danger, response, airway, breathing. Speak to them. If unresponsive and not breathing normally, start compressions — hard and fast, centre of the chest. The operator will pace you. See CPR basics.

4. Catastrophic bleeding, before almost anything else. Firm direct pressure with the cleanest cloth to hand, or a bare hand if there is nothing.

5. Keep them warm and still. A shocked patient loses heat rapidly, including on a mild day. Get something between them and the ground and something over them.

6. Do not move them unless there is immediate danger — fire, traffic, water.

What works, improvised

Bleeding. Any clean absorbent material, pressed hard and directly onto the point of bleeding, held continuously. Do not lift to check — that is what breaks the clot. If it soaks through, add on top rather than replacing. A rolled sock or shirt pressed into a deep wound works better than a flat pad over it.

Burns. Cool running water for 20 minutes — a water bottle poured slowly counts, and 20 minutes is the actual evidence-based figure, not a rough guide. Then cover loosely with cling film or a clean plastic bag. Never ice, never butter, never creams. See burns first aid.

Broken arm. A jumper as a sling, or simply strapping the arm against the body with a seatbelt extender or a jacket tied around. Immobilising it against the trunk is often better than a splint.

Broken lower leg. Pad between the legs and bind them together. The uninjured leg is the best splint available.

Suspected spinal injury. Leave them where they are, tell them to stay still, and pad around the head with rolled clothing to discourage movement. Do not attempt to apply a collar or move them onto anything.

Eye injury. Flush with clean water for 15–20 minutes for chemicals. For a penetrating object, do not remove it, cover both eyes loosely — the injured eye tracks with the good one — and get to hospital.

Shock. Lie them down, keep them warm, keep them still, reassure them. Nothing to eat or drink.

Hypothermia. Every layer helps, and insulation underneath matters as much as over. See hypothermia signs and treatment.

What not to improvise

A tourniquet from a belt, shoelace or cable tie. Improvised tourniquets fail frequently — they are too narrow, cannot be tightened enough, and a partially effective tourniquet can increase bleeding by blocking venous return while arterial flow continues. If bleeding is truly uncontrollable and you have no proper tourniquet, pack the wound firmly with cloth and press with your full body weight, and keep pressing until the ambulance arrives. A commercial tourniquet is around $40 and belongs in your car.

Moving someone with a suspected spinal injury. Unless there is immediate danger to life.

Giving anything by mouth to someone seriously injured or drowsy.

Removing an embedded object. Pad around it.

Realigning an obvious fracture. Splint it as it lies, unless the limb is blue and pulseless and help is hours away.

Antiseptic creams or ointments on burns. Water, then a clean covering.

Thresholds

Situation	The rule
Arriving at a roadside incident	Scene safety first. You are no use as a second casualty
Any serious injury	000 on speaker, immediately. Emergency+ app for location
Not breathing normally	Compressions now. Operator will pace you
Bleeding	Firm direct pressure, don’t lift to check, add layers on top
Uncontrolled bleeding, no proper tourniquet	Pack the wound and press with body weight. Do not improvise a belt tourniquet
Burn	20 minutes of cool running water, then cling film. No ice
Suspected spinal injury	Do not move. Pad around the head
Anyone injured and lying down	Insulate from the ground. Cold kills shocked patients
Broken limb	Splint as it lies. Uninjured leg or the trunk is the best splint

What it costs

Tier	Spend	What it buys
Free	$0	Everything in this article. A shirt, a seatbelt, a phone and a blanket
Free	$0	The Emergency+ app. Gives an operator your exact coordinates
Solid	~$40–80	A basic car first aid kit — dressings, gloves, triangular bandages, a space blanket
Better	~$100–160	Add a commercial tourniquet, a compressed trauma dressing and shears. This is the gap that improvisation genuinely cannot fill
Worth it	~$100–200	A one-day first aid course. Everything here works better with an afternoon of practice

The drill: the ten-minute car audit

Do this in your driveway tonight.

1. Open the boot. What in there could stop bleeding? Insulate someone? Splint an arm?
2. Install the Emergency+ app and open it once so you know what it looks like.
3. Put a picnic blanket and an old towel in the boot. Two dollars at an op shop, and both do real work.
4. Add a bottle of water you do not drink from.
5. Check the hi-vis vest and hazard triangle exist.
6. Then buy the kit anyway — improvisation is a fallback, not a plan. See the car emergency kit checklist.

Frequently asked questions

What should I do first at a roadside accident?

Make the scene safe — hazard lights, park well back, watch oncoming traffic — then call 000 on speaker. Rescuers are frequently injured at roadside incidents, and a second casualty makes the situation worse for everyone.

Can I use a belt as a tourniquet?

No. Improvised tourniquets are usually too narrow and cannot be tightened enough, and a partially effective one can worsen bleeding by blocking venous return while arterial flow continues. Pack the wound and apply firm body-weight pressure instead, and carry a proper tourniquet.

How long should a burn be cooled?

Twenty minutes of cool running water, which is the actual evidence-based figure. A water bottle poured slowly counts. Then cover loosely with cling film or a clean plastic bag. Never use ice, butter or creams.

What can I use as a splint in a car?

A floor mat, a rolled magazine, cardboard, an umbrella or a tent pole, padded with clothing. Often better still, immobilise an arm against the trunk with a jacket or seatbelt, or bind an injured leg to the uninjured one.

Should I move someone after a crash?

Only if there is immediate danger such as fire, traffic or water. Otherwise leave them where they are, tell them to stay still, and pad around the head with rolled clothing to discourage movement.

How do I give my location to an ambulance?

Install the Emergency+ app, which displays your exact coordinates and can pass them to the operator. On a rural road with no address, that is the difference between a fast response and a search.

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Sources

• St John Ambulance Australia — first aid resources
• Australian Resuscitation Council — guidelines
• ANZBA — first aid for burns
• Emergency+ app — Triple Zero Victoria and national partners
• healthdirect — first aid basics