Parents need to be so careful when feeding their babies and small children. Even something like a small grape can easily choke a child to death within minutes if no treatment is given to clear this blockage.
Simple things like cutting the children’s food into small pieces and supervising them at meal times. If they should choke on a small piece of food then they should encourage the child to cough, quite often they can dislodge it themselves.
Quite often a simple backslap can be enough to dislodge it and quite often this works very well.
Not so long ago our MD was in a coffee shop with a friend and a child started to choke on a piece of muffin cake and noticed everybody was just watching this child go blue. An ambulance was called, and our MD let the parents know he was a healthcare professional and asked the mother if she would like some help (consent must be granted before you can touch anyone who is conscious). Permission was granted and treatment was provided treatment to the child, here is the blog on what happened that day.
Did you know our NHS has a great guide on what to do when a small child chokes, it doesn’t replace actual first aid training but may be a useful guide.
You cannot do any harm if you give backslaps to a child if they are choking, but giving abdominal thrusts or chest thrusts on a baby or small child can cause serious harm if you have not received any first aid training, the child or adult should always be checked out by a healthcare professional.
