Personal First Aid Kit

Click here for a printer-friendly PDF

Make your own first-aid kit to put with the 10 Essentials.

One of the most important items among the 10 Essentials is a first-aid kit. Not meant to carry everything you could possibly need, it should carry items that will address common hiker maladies and items that apply to your personal health situation.

While you can purchase ready-made first-aid kits at stores, we recommend tweaking it to suit your needs or even assembling your own. This will ensure that you are familiar with its contents and have some understanding of how to use what is in it. This list below offers a suggestion of some basic items that should be in personal first-aid kits. We encourage you to seek further information with a medical professional or enroll in a Wilderness First-Aid course.

A basic first-aid kit should include:

• Any prescription medications in a labeled bag
• Several sealed, single use packs of ibuprofen, Imodium® (for upset stomach and diarrhea), and an antihistamine (treats allergic reactions)
• Moleskin and athletic tape
• Various adhesive bandages of varying size
• A small roll of sterile gauze
• A CPR mask
• Several pairs of latex or nitrile gloves
• Alcohol based sanitizing gel
• A pair of tweezers
• A CPR/First aid card
• A small knife or scissors
• Antiseptic ointment, to be used only after cleaning a wound
• Hydrocortisone cream for insect bites and poisonous plants
• Liquid bandages
• Safety pins
• Electrolyte replacement powder (homemade or similar to Gatorade®)