Fatality Prevention: Grim But Necessary

Today I went to an OEASA workshop called Preventing Fatalities in Nature Based Outdoor Activities. Yes, it was as morbid as it reads. I knew when I signed up that it was going to be quite a confronting day and really challenging emotionally. But I also knew that conversations around preparing for the possibility of deaths are important! 

We had some pre reading to complete before the workshop - one paper covering 4 cases that have occured for whole group discussion this arvo and one case that was specifically designated to me to share with the group. I really enjoyed having this prep time beforehand, as it gave me time to process some of the information, reflect on the scenarios and how I would have responded in them and also complete some further research about what could have been done to prevent/reduce the possibility of the tragedies. I also felt like I was back at uni, which I loved because I love learning!

The key things I took away from the pre-reading were;
- Competitiveness can have significant impacts on young people's choices and ultimately their safety. The word 'challenge' therefore, should be used carefully!
- "Adolescents tend to wrongly assume something is safe if they try it and experience no adverse consequence" (Reyna & Farley, 2006). We know that assuming generally has it's own consequences...
- There shouldn't need to be a near miss or incidents to occur for people to act on it/prepare for the possibility of something occuring. This shows the importance of having discussions about a variety of scenarios that could occur, no matter how low the likelihood is.
- Prepare for the worst case scenario in any setting - and prepare the students for this too. They need to understand that the teachers/facilitators/instructors are vulnerable in the outdoors too, so at some point they need to be the 'leader'!

A large section of the day was sharing the narrative of the case we were given, and then discussing how the fatality could have been prevented. In all of the cases, something could have been done. Majority of the cases were water based - mostly drownings. Many of them were also based in New Zealand, which made me super uncomfortable (but I had an early colleage, Adam, in my mind saying 'be comfortable with the uncomfortable!'). I found the discussions with the group incredibly valuable too though, because people were able to see things from different perspectives as well as share their own experiences. 

My case was about a young boy who drowned only a few metres away from the edge of a lake with his peers and teachers closeby. Truly devastating. Unfortunately there were several steps that could have been taken to prevent (or at least significantly reduce) this fatality from occuring; more active supervision, education for the students, flotation aids available, greater knowledge about the depth and colour of the water, aquatic knowledge and skills taught, risk managament discussion and plans for this swim (this was not an aquatics camp or a planned activity), confidence and competence checks of students in, near and around water and more efficient procedures in first aid scenarios (such as faster contact with emergency services). See below the quick drawing I created while I was explaining the case with the group (it's a bit messy, but I find visuals to give more context! The x's represent people, and there were others that I did not include). Honestly, it was gobsmacking to read and gut-wrenching to recount.

Throughout the day we had a lot of great discussion - it was so eye opening for me. There were parts of some of the scenarios that I thought 'how on Earth could you make that dedcision', but then other times I was left thinking 'I actually could have been in that position'. I feel like I will certainly be a lot more aware of fatality prevention and will certainly include this in my prep with students too. Here are a few things I was left thinking more about:
- Just because you have safety considerations, does not mean that you have fatality preventions. RAMS often consider low to medium level possibilities, but I don't think I have actually ever seen one that specific considers the possibility of a death.
- If there is an incident or tragedy - what measures could have been put in place to prevent this? (Note this can be any situation, not a personal one!)
- Many of the scenarios discussed today were the 'same story with different actors' - so they could have been prevented.
- "Experience is an unreliable guide to fatality prevention." Assume you know nothing.
- The use of real case/scenario based learning in class is helpful to prepare students for the possibility they find themselves in that situation. This rang particularly true with the fatality case of a student passing from anaphylaxis and another student wasn't sure if they could use an Epipen on them.

If you are wanting to learn more, check out this paper by Andrew Brookes, who was our workshop faciltator today. With regard to safety, you can never learn too much!