Managing Hypothermia

One Cold, Wet and Windy Day in the Peak District …

Kinder Scout in the Peak District with some clients. The weather was horrendous: rain, clag and high winds. We were just beyond the top of Crowden Clough when two young ladies came out of the murk, sobbing that their dog was having a seizure and they didn’t know what to do: could I help? Her dog was slumped lifeless in her arms, not looking well at all.

Get the casualties out of the environment

It was cold, and the first thing I noticed was that this one lass had taken her own coat off and wrapped it around her dog, and she was just wearing a base-layer for herself. On such days, I always carry a group-shelter, which is like a small parachute. I deployed this and then suddenly all the noise and all of the wind were gone. Relative silence. We hunched in a circle with the shelter stretched around our backs and the wind was no longer ripping through us and, no longer robbing us of our heat.

I wanted to know if the casualty was still alive. He was just about able to open his eyes, and his gums looked pink (which told me there was still oxygenated blood being pumped to the surface, and so his heart must be working). I think the key reason I wanted to do this is because I wanted something positive to tell the poor girl holding her limp dog.

The patient here was an Italian greyhound called Marv. He was dressed in his own warm coat (and his owner’s one now), but the day’s exertions had just been too much.

Don’t rub a cold casualty

The young lady started rubbing Marv to get him warm – and I needed to stop her doing this. When we rub our skin, the capillaries dilate and open up and bring more blood to the surface, which then cools and returns to the core.

Treat the whole team for hypothermia

I knew the casualty here needed sugar. If he were going to create any heat he would need to metabolise energy. He wasn’t able to eat for himself, but I did have some glucose gel in my first aid kit and so I rubbed this into his gums. Marv had a sibling, though looking in a much safer state, was also being carried by the other lass. If there’s one casualty with hypothermia, you have always got to ask yourself, who’s next!? So I gave him some of the gel too, which he happily licked off my fingers.

Marv’s owner was my next concern. This whole time she had been kneeling there in her wet skin-tight top, still with her coat wrapped around Marv. We agreed a plan: I’d give my spare layer to Marv, and she would put her own coat back on. Then we’d put Marv down her front, and with a climbing sling I had, we’d tie him in securely.  

Not dead until they’re warm and dead

Marv was now looking really bad. He was still limp in her arms but not responding in any way: he was no longer opening his eyes. The poor owner was sobbing that her dog was dead. The words “not dead until he’s warm and dead” came to mind, but I chose not to say them. I did try to reassure her, however, that really cold casualties do a really good job of looking really ill, and that actually I thought Marv might be alright once he’d properly warmed up again, in a few hours time. A cold casualty can’t be pronounced dead: they have to be slowly warmed up to normal body temperature before a diagnosis of death can be pronounced.

Hastily we stashed the group shelter away and carefully made our way down to my car. I drove the two girls and the dogs back to their waiting car, and they drove to the vets. A few hours later Marv was, as predicted right as rain, sat up right ready for his next adventure on the floor of the vets.

Post Note: the owner of Marv felt beside herself with guilt that this had happened. But she was not to blame. Every weekend she would take her dogs out in all weathers, and to date they had always been fine. They were a pair of well-exercised dogs, happy and well wrapped up for these conditions.