title: Community-based first aid: a program report on the intersection of community-based participatory research and first aid education in a remote Canadian Aboriginal community.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Community-based first aid training is the collaborative development of locally relevant emergency response training. The Sachigo Lake Wilderness Emergency Response Education Initiative was developed, delivered, and evaluated through two intensive 5-day first aid courses. Sachigo Lake First Nation is a remote Aboriginal community of 450 people in northern Ontario, Canada, with no local paramedical services. These courses were developed in collaboration with the community, with a goal of building community capacity to respond to medical emergencies.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  Most first aid training programs rely on standardized curriculum developed for urban and rural contexts with established emergency response systems. Delivering effective community-based first aid training in a remote Aboriginal community required specific adaptations to conventional first aid educational content and pedagogy.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Three key lessons emerged during this program that used collaborative principles to adapt conventional first aid concepts and curriculum: (1) standardized approaches may not be relevant nor appropriate; (2) relationships between course participants and the people they help are relevant and important; (3) curriculum must be attentive to existing informal and formal emergency response systems. These lessons may be instructive for the development of other programs in similar settings.
authors.affiliation: Northern Ontario School of Medicine c/o Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre 980 Oliver Rd. Thunder Bay, ON Canada P7B 6V4. david.vanderburgh@nosm.ca.
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: VanderBurgh
authors.affiliation: Alberta Health Services - Calgary Metro EMS 3705 35 Street NE, Calgary, Alberta T1Y 6C2. Rachel.Jamieson@albertahealthservices.ca.
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Jamieson
authors.affiliation: Sachigo Lake First Nation PO Box 51 Sachigo Lake, ON Canada P0V 2P0. jacksonabeardy@sachigo.ca.
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Beardy
authors.affiliation: School of Rural and Northern Health; ECHO (Evaluating Children's Health Outcomes) Research Centre Laurentian University Ramsey Lake Road Sudbury, ON Canada P3E 2C6. sritchie@laurentian.ca.
authors.forename: S D
authors.initials: SD
authors.lastname: Ritchie
authors.affiliation: Northern Ontario School of Medicine 955 Oliver Road  Thunder Bay, ON Canada P7B 5E1. aorkin@nosm.ca.
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Orkin
mesh_terms: D055812:Community-Based Participatory Research; D005392:First Aid; D006266:Health Education / Q000458:organization & administration*; D006801:Humans; D007198:Indians, North American; D009864:Ontario; D019035:Rural Health Services / Q000458:organization & administration*