Stop, Drop and Blog

Did you know that June is Home Safety Month? It is. Timely as I’ve been reviewing a product and forming a post about home safety and your kitchen for the past week. And here it is: Do you have a First Aid Kit in your kitchen? No? You should.

Most households store their First Aid Kit (singular) underneath the sink in their main bathroom. For some homes, that’s not exactly right next to the stove or kitchen knives, where a lot of kitchen accidents occur. To be honest, you need your big kit to be in an easily accessible place in your home. You also need a smaller one in your kitchen and, if you have a playroom, it wouldn’t hurt to have one hanging out on a shelf that the kids cannot reach.

Today I’m talking about your smaller Kitchen First Aid Kit. It doesn’t need to be big. If you’re injured in the kitchen, you want to do one of two things: stop the bleeding or stop the burning. Therefore, you need some adhesive bandages, gauze strips and antibiotic cream. And one more product: Burn Jel Plus by Water-Jel Technologies.

Listen. I’m speaking from personal experience. I’ve been burned, badly, in the kitchen. While making dinner for my family in my early teen years, I overturned an entire spaghetti pot of boiling water on my leg. Thankfully we had just learned to strip off clothing if you were burned like that (make that note right now) and the wind-jammer-type-material (oh, early 90’s!) of my shorts did not melt into my leg. I did, however, experience a lot of pain, need to go to the emergency room after soaking it in a tub of lukewarm water and still have a scar to this day.

Now, my burn was big. But the truth remains that every 25 seconds someone in the United States is burned or scalded in their home, according to the American Burn Association and the Burn Foundation. That’s over two million burn injuries per year. Scary, right? Want some scarier stuff? Children under five experience their burns most frequently in the kitchen, followed by the bathroom. Hot water, like my experience, is the leading cause of accidental death in the home for children under five and accounts for 60% of burns in children under fourteen (hi! that was me!).

Enter the aforementioned Burn Jel Plus. Water-Jel Technolgies is the world’s leading provider of professional burn treaments used most by EMS workers (you know, like FireDad). But Burn Jel Plus is for you, me and well, even FireDad at home. It’s over-the-counter and easy to use. The water based product contains Lidocaine, an topical analgesic, for fast-acting pain relief. It basically cools off the burn site by acting as a “heat exchanger.” Why is that important? Burns are an evolving injury in which tissue damage can increase until the burn temperature is lowered enough to stop the burn process. Meaning you want to cool that burn off/down immediately to reduce the risk of further injury. Even burns from things like hot coffee can cause bigger injuries if not properly treated.

Sure, you could just hold the burn under a faucet. But how was I going to hold my entire thigh under a faucet? You can’t. And if you’re trying to hold a wiggly child under a faucet, well, you’re just insane. Burn Jel Plus can be applied directly to the burn, including faces. No need to try to fight a screaming, hurt child to get their elbow to bend at just the right angle to fit it under the faucet in your sink. Of note: ice, butter and other food substances should never be applied to a burn. Butter will trap heat and make the burn worse.

In short: you need this in your Kitchen First Aid Kit. Your child needs you to have this in your Kitchen First Aid Kit. Your husband needs it. And, if you’re a klutz like me, well, you need it, too. I actually got to physically review this product late last week when I forgot that my hands don’t sprout Go-Go-Gadget Potholders and grabbed a pot just off the stove. Thankfully I just burned my thumb a bit. I put the gel on (after maneuvering the childproof cap with a burnt thumb) and did feel immediate relief. As an added bonus? This product can safely be used on sunburns. (But put oxybenzone-free sunblock on your kids to avoid that usage, okay?)

And while we all know these things, here are some kitchen safety reminders: cook on the back burners, turn all handles towards the back of the stove, use potholders (ha!), never leave your cooking food unattended, check the handles on your pots and pans regularly to avoid breakage and dropping and remove covers on pots, pans and microwaved dishes away from your face and hands/arms.

I’ve been burned in the kitchen. I’m married to a fire fighter. We both know what bad burns can do. Trust us on this one. You need a Kitchen First Aid Kit. Your “big” First Aid Kit needs to be easily accessible. And a product like Burn Jel Plus can only help you or your children in the case of any burn. Burn Jel Plus is available nationwide at stores like CVS, Walgreens and, yes, even Walmart for $8.99. At that price, you can’t afford not to have it in your kitchen. (Going camping? Take it along.)

Next week I’m going to talk about smoke detectors, the various kinds and why you need more than one.

(PS: Read how someone actually used this product in a bigger burn than my forgotten potholder experience.)