Venturing out into the backcountry, in any form, is a serious undertaking. Whether you’re ski touring deep in the mountains in the middle of January or doing laps at your local crag on the hottest day in July, our collective pursuit of happiness in the outdoors carries with it some inherent risk—and locales remote enough to require a degree of self-reliance should things go sideways. This is why a first aid kit is absolutely essential on a wilderness sojourn of any scale. Should you really need it—and that occasion may never come—it’ll be the ounce-for-ounce most valuable thing you packed in that day.

A likely—and far less grave—scenario is that your first aid kit is used in increments, for small concerns. A bandage here for a nagging blister, an ibuprofen there for a morning after too many camp beers—that kind of thing. Not a big deal, but over the course of a season or two, you may find that these benign applications have slowly eroded the contents of your first aid kit since you first purchased, adding up to a severely depleted stock.

Fortunately, reupping a first aid kit is a simple task that’ll have you thinking about what you’re carrying while affording you the option to customize your kit based on the activity you’re after, and spring training season is the perfect time to give your kit a look-over and make sure its ready for a summer of adventuring.

The severely depleted contents of an AMK Ultralight/Watertight .5 Medical Kit after a few seasons of light use. | Credit: John Lepak
The severely depleted contents of an AMK Ultralight/Watertight .5 Medical Kit after a few seasons of light use. | Credit: John Lepak

Where to Begin

Odds are your starting point for a first aid kit is of one of the pre-packaged variety. These come in all shapes and sizes and are designed for myriad uses. Adventure Medical Kits makes it easy on us though by specifying how many days and how many people each of their kits can service. Products like the .7 Ultralight/Watertight Medical Kit, for example, are designed specifically for up to two users on trips up to four days while heavier duty options, like the Mountain Explorer First Aid Kit, are stocked for four people for up to a week.

Generally speaking, the lightest of these kits include:

  • Bandage materials, such as gauze, sterile dressings, adhesive bandages, and medical tape;
  • Antibacterial wipes, ointments and other topical applications to clean and treat wounds;
  • Medication, including ibuprofen, aspirin, and antihistamines;
  • Moleskin for blister care, and;
  • Tweezers, which are wicked handy for splinters and ticks.

Your first step is to take an inventory. What do you have? Next, take a look at what the kit’s manufacturer lists on their site for the kit’s contents, note what’s missing, and make a list. If you’re empty in any specific area it may be worth doubling up on those items for the future.

Buying larger quantities cuts down on nasty excess packaging. | Credit: John Lepak
Buying larger quantities cuts down on nasty excess packaging. | Credit: John Lepak

The Resupply

Actually restocking these items is as simple as raiding the medicine cabinet or popping by the drug store, but there are some things to consider while you do so. Medical products are very heavily packaged, for good reason—maintaining sterile dressings and uncontaminated medication is incredibly important. It does, however, result in a substantial amount of single-use plastics, foils, and other non-recyclable materials that amount to tons and tons of waste. Buying items in larger quantities and divvying them up between reusable containers reduces the impact significantly. It also ensures the home medicine cabinet will survive the resupplying of your backcountry first aid kit. Larger bottles of commonly-used medication—like pain relievers or antihistamines—are the way to go. As for bandages, products that have a variety of types, all in the same box, are a good bet.

Consider supplementing your kit based on where you’re planning to go and what you’re planning to do. | Credit: John Lepak
Consider supplementing your kit based on where you’re planning to go and what you’re planning to do. | Credit: John Lepak

Addition by Addition

Following a manufacturer’s template is a great starting point but how we get outdoors isn’t one-size-fits all. Personal experience, knowledge of the terrain, and the nuances of the activity will also dictate just what you need when you go out. Here are some additional things to consider adding to your kit while you’re at it.

Splint

It’ll add a bit of bulk and a minor amount of weight to your pack, but consider adding a splint like the AMK C-Splint to your kit. A broken bone is a serious issue if you’re really out in the backcountry, and immobilizing any such injury shouldn’t need to be a MacGuyver-esque exercise in bushcraft—besides, would you rather be limping down the trail with a well-dressed splint or a twig affixed to your leg with a length of prusik cord and some climbers’ tape?

Emergency Blanket

A severe enough injury may pin your party down in a single location for awhile so ensuring the patient is warm is critical, especially in winter, when hypothermia is a real concern. An emergency blanket like the Karrimor Survival Blanket is a handy addition to any first aid kit. They’re lightweight and useful beyond an injury situation.

Snake Bite Kit

It’s not so much an issue up north, but venomous snakes are a real thing while hiking and climbing in southern New England and New York. There is a reasonably healthy timber rattlesnake population in both the Catskills and the Taconics and Copperheads are extremely common on the traprock ridges of Connecticut. Though sightings still are rare—and incidents even rarer—all it takes is bumping into one on the trail before you’re carrying a kit like this when venturing into these areas.

Packing smart ensures that you can get to what you need quickly. | Credit: John Lepak
Packing smart ensures that you can get to what you need quickly. | Credit: John Lepak

Put it Together

Stuffing everything back into your first aid kit can be a pain, especially with the super-compact prepackaged ones that are designed to prioritize efficiency of weight and space. Try to keep the different items separated from one another—group bandaged with an elastic band or sort pills with reusable plastic baggies. Keep in mind how quickly you may need to access something and organize accordingly.

A first aid kit should go into your pack as a single unit, stowed away somewhere that’s easy to get to. It doesn’t need to be at the top—you shouldn’t be digging past it to get to your water or an extra layer or anything—but it should be accessible. Keeping it in the same place every time you go out is a good practice too, so that you’re always going to know where it is.