What To Do during a shark attack

Dr Jon Cohen is a member of the Surfing Doctors, and he assembles and sells Shark Attack Slam Packs. So we got going with a few questions about the reality of shark attacks.

WHAT DO PEOPLE NOT UNDERSTAND WHEN IT COMES TO A SHARK ATTACK AND ON-THE SPOT TREATMENT?

People all think that a helicopter and a fancy hospital are going to keep you alive. That doesn’t happen. When an attack goes down, it happens so fast. Most bites are on the limbs, meaning they’re considered “compressible haemorrhage” in the medical world. This means that you can usually stop people from dying with fundamental equipment and straightforward methods.

WHAT ARE THE BIGGEST MISTAKES WHEN DEALING WITH ON-THE-SPOT SHARK BITES?

Firstly, without actually being involved in saving a loved one, it feels false to say what went wrong or that someone made a mistake. The central theme, though, when really heavy stuff happens, a sort of group paralysis can set in. It just takes one soul to step up calmly and assertively, and everyone else will fall in line and obey instructions.

WHAT DO YOU DO WHEN THERE IS JUST A MINOR BITE BUT LOADS OF BLOOD AND GORE.

Blood is such a tricky thing to work with — it can appear to be so much more than what it is, especially when mixed with drama and water. A life-threatening bleed means that blood is shooting out, pouring out, soaking straight through a towel, making puddles on the floor and making the victim woozy. If this is happening, then you need to stop the bleeding immediately. Direct pressure works — press straight on the wound to stop the blood from coming

out. If it’s a leg or arm, you need to get a tourniquet on and get help. Once the tourniquet’s on, you can relax – you’ve got at least three hours before the tourniquet starts to inflict damage.

WHAT TO DO WHEN THERE IS A MAJOR BITE AND A LOSS OF LIMB?

It only takes a few short minutes to bleed out from an amputation. Having a tourniquet on you would be the ultimate lifesaver. It’s not that hard to do. The best solution currently available for this is the SWAT-T. It is cheap, rugged, easy to use and small enough to fit in your chest zip. (Stretch, Wrap And Tuck – Tourniquet).

WHAT DO YOU DO WHEN THERE IS LOSS OF LIFE AND A MASSIVE DRAMA ON THE BEACH?

Total nightmare. Crowd control is the major problem here. The person who brought the victim to shore usually assigns one person to crowd control and have them clear a perimeter. There’s likely to be only one physical casualty in situations like this but multiple people exposed to severe psychological trauma. In critical care, we try to do an immediate debrief after any challenging cases. This is a time for people to connect to help prevent long-term psychological trauma to those who’ve done their best trying to help. Guilt, shame and grief and seriously problematic issues down the line, but airing them early can stop them from recurring down the track.

IF YOU WANT TO READ UP MORE ABOUT THE SHARK ATTACK KITS THAT DR COHEN DISTRIBUTES, CHECK THEM OUT HERE - bettersurf.com.au/