Signs and Treatment of Hypothermia, photo by shirokazan
When I was a teenager, my two brothers and I took a series of wilderness survival classes. I don’t remember much of what we learned, but I distinctly remember the instructor talking about hypothermia. He told us that people don’t freeze to death, they get hypothermia and die. I guess that jarred my reality enough that it stuck with me all these years. Now I’m in the middle of CERT training, the first aid part, and one of the topics we covered was hypothermia. That same hypothermia that was killing people in the outdoors over 20 years ago is still the number one killer of outdoor folks.
Hypothermia occurs when your body’s core temperature falls below 95 degrees Fahrenheit. This can happen easily in the winter, but can and does occur any time of the year, especially if you are wet and there is a breeze. There are three stages: mild, moderate, and severe.
Symptoms of Mild Hypothermia:
- Body shivering that can be stopped
- Redness or blueness of the skin
- Numbness
Symptoms of Moderate Hypothermia:
- Body shivering that cannot be controlled
- Mumbles, Grumbles, and Stumbles: Slurred speech, unpredictable behavior, and listlessness/aimless wandering
- Confusion, memory loss
- Shallow breathing
Symptoms of Severe Hypothermia:
- No more shivering
- Exhaustion
- Loss of conciousness
Treatment:
As soon as you recognize the signs of hypothermia in yourself or someone you are with, it is imperative to start treating it.
- Warm them up. Remove any wet clothing, build a fire, get out of the elements. Wrap them in a blanket and cover the head and neck as well–you lose a lot of heat through your head. The instructor of my teenage survival course said one of the best ways to warm someone up was to get a warm person into a sleeping bag with them. You may need to remove layers of clothing to make the most effective use of your own body heat to help warm up your cold friend.
- Give them sugar, food, and warm drinks. The reason the shivering stops between stage two and three is that the person has used their energy stores. A sweet drink can help their body have the energy to continue shivering and the shivering is the body’s own way to get itself warmed back up. Warm Gatorade with added sugar is perfect. Avoid alcohol or caffeine.
- Give them a warm bath. This is a great idea if you have warm water and a bathtub handy. If you’re really out in the woods you won’t have that luxury. However, you may be able to . . .
- Warm the primary pressure points. Think of the places your large blood vessels are near the surface–neck, groin, and arm pits. You can use a hot water bottle if you’re near civilization, or you can use those handy little hand or toe warmers.
- If your victim is unconscious, lay them down, raise their legs, and get them warm as soon as possible. A person whose body temperature drops low enough can look dead but still be alive. Their heart can beat as slow as 3 beats per minute, which may not be detected when feeling for a pulse. With hypothermia, cold and dead is not 100% accurate. You want to warm your victim up before making the judgment on whether they are alive or not.
Keeping your body’s core temperature stable is an important part of staying alive in the outdoors. Knowing the signs and treatment of hypothermia could save the life of a loved one or even yourself.