Community development of basic first aid training for hispanic dairy workers

Objective: Development of agricultural specific first aid training Methods: The NYCAMH Farm Emergency Response Program has traditionally provided bilingual Heartsaver CPR and first aid certification to farmers, their workers and families through the American Heart Association. However, this certification is time-consuming and emergencies covered are not specific to agriculture. Using a community based approach, NYCAMH has combined input from farmers and workers with injury data collected through NYCAMH's agriculture injury surveillance study to develop a new “basic dairy first aid curriculum”. NYCAMH collaborated with migrant educators, outreach and extension staff, dairy farm owners and Hispanic farmworkers in northern New York to revise existing emergency and first aid training. New curriculum aimed to efficiently convey emergency and first aid information that was appropriate and specific for the dairy workplace. Training content focused on injury data collected from the current NEC agriculture injury surveillance study. Results: Educational sessions have been carried out at 17 sites involving 95 workers. Worker feedback led to the development of low-literacy bilingual print materials to supplement the training. These include wallet cards for pertinent health and emergency contact information. To ensure worker comprehension of basic topics, a pre/post test evaluation component has been added, indicating significant (p<.001)increase in knowledge.