As an EMT, I have the necessary skills I would need in an emergency situation, and you should have a basic knowledge of first aid as well. First Aid skills are good to know for everyday life, but can be especially important during an emergency
Why First Aid Knowledge is Important
I cannot express the importance of basic first aid without having you understand how treatment of some injuries are time sensitive.
If major bleeding is not controlled quickly the person will go into shock and this will lead to death. Any type of shock is difficult to reverse even in a hospital setting, so when you know how to control bleeding you will be saving that person’s life especially if you can prevent them from going into shock before they arrive at the hospital or clinic.
Another example is someone who receives a burn. Even a small burn can become a major issue if not properly treated quickly. The biggest concern with a burn is infection. Limiting infection while treating the wound will be important. Of course infection control of any open wound will be important for the same reason as a burn wound.
Infections can get into the blood stream and spread to all internal organs of the body. If this happens and not treated very early, the organs will begin to fail and death will be eminent.
Remember, even the smallest cut can kill if precautions for protecting against infection is not started very soon after the injury happens, and continued while the wound is open and the environment is not the cleanest. This is where having first aid supplies will be beneficial.
How First Aid Knowledge Can Help
If you ever come upon a vehicle accident, having basic first aid skills will 
allow you to assist an injured person properly until more experienced personnel arrive to the scene. During a natural disaster, it can take help longer to arrive than normal, and you could be the difference between life and death for family, friends, and neighbors.
Knowing how to control bleeding, splint extremities, and the signs and treatment for shock, can limit even more damage along with delaying death.
The skills you will want to learn will depend on the types of injuries you may see with the types of disasters in you area, but I recommend learning everything you possibly can.
First Aid Kits
There are a variety of first aid kits on the market, and they are designed and stocked for different situations. You can have a different kit for you home, office, and car. Each will have many similar items between them, but they will also have different items as well, depending on the intended use of the kit.
You will want a kit that will have everything you might need during an emergency. Most kits come stocked with specific items, but you also have 
the option to build you own. The cost of building you own kit may not be something you can afford, so look for a kit that can meet most of you needs and add to that kit.
Remember, the kit needs to be easily accessible, as well as easy to transport.
Learning Basic First Aid
There are many ways to get the first aid knowledge you may want, but I will say that it will be a time commitment. There are programs that you will be required to pay for, as well as commit specific time to and you may not have this ability. You can start looking for programs within you local community that may teach first aid for free to their citizens, or you can check the local hospitals and EMS services to see if they offer any first aid training. These will also require you to dedicate some time, but the cost could be low if there is a cost.
In rural areas the fire departments may be volunteer based and have first responders that assist EMS with responding and treating patients in the community. They will train you in first aid with you agreeing to respond to calls for the service.
There are also books and videos that can be useful, but taking a class gives you an idea of how to control an emergency situation calmly and efficiently with examples of unusual calls encountered by the instructors in the past.
You can be the one that saves a life with first aid training, and I will share a quick story on how this was done by a classmate while we were getting our EMT training.
He was a volunteer first responder in his community and responded to a call about a person that had fell in their residence and not responding to family members present. He arrived on the scene and quickly determined that the patient was in cardiac arrest, which means the patient was not breathing and heart not beating. With his training as a first responder and what we had already learned in class he was able to get the heart started back and the patient breathing again before the ambulance arrived on scene. Had he not responded and acted quickly that patient could have died before EMS ever arrived. This shows that in some emergency situations every second counts, and the faster aid is given the better the outcome will be.
Conclusion
First aid training will allow you to assist during emergency situations, and potentially save the life of someone you love. To gain the knowledge you will need will require a time commitment that will be well worth all the time in the world when the life of a loved one is saved. Get the training you need, and start small if you have to. This, to me, is one of the more important aspects of being prepared for emergencies.
I will leave you with a final thought and say that there have been cases in the past where someone without the proper training thought they were doing right and assisting an injured person, but ended up causing more harm than if they had not touched the person. Trying to help someone without the knowledge of first aid causes more harm than good in some cases.
Get first aid training even if it is very basic and minimal. You can build you training as you have time, but the important thing is that you start and get the basics.
Happy preparing!
