First Aid Training

At least one person per shift, assigned to work at the facility, shall be trained in First Aid/CPR, as defined by the American Red Cross, and CPR, as defined by the American Heart Association.  Training shall also cover:

(a) Awareness of potential emergency situations;

(b) Transfer to appropriate health care provider;

(c) Recognition of symptoms of illness most common to the facility; and,

(d) Giving medications to inmates.

In addition, the health authority shall approve policies and procedures that insure that emergency supplies and equipment are readily available and in working order. Rules of the Tennessee Corrections Institute, Rule 1400-1-.13(15).

First aid kits shall be available and a physician shall approve the number, contents, and location of such kits on an annual basis.  Documentation of such approval must be in the facility’s permanent records or attached to the kit itself. Rules of the Tennessee Corrections Institute, Rule 1400-1-.13(7).

“Jail personnel should be trained in basic health care delivery and must be trained in emergency health techniques.” Nicholson v. Choctaw County, 498 F.Supp. 295, 309 (S.D. Ala. 1980). See also Bunyon v. Burke County, 306 F.Supp.2d 1240, 1258 (S.D. Ga. 2004) (It is undisputed that jail staff are charged with ensuring that an inmate's medical needs are met while he or she is detained at the county Jail. Thus, the need to train personnel in the constitutional requirements of providing adequate medical care can be said to be so obvious that failure to do so could properly be characterized as deliberate indifference to constitutional rights.); Brock v. Warren County, 713 F.Supp. 238, 243 (E.D. Tenn. 1989) (finding that the sheriff and the county commissioners were deliberately indifferent to plaintiffs' decedent's constitutional rights in failing to provide minimal medical training to the jail guards).