Rosewood First Aid Kit

A first aid kit is only ever useful because it was already there. Nobody assembles one during the emergency, and the whole value of a boxed one is that the decision to keep saline and gauze in the car was made on a calm afternoon by somebody who was not, at that moment, holding a bleeding dog.

This one holds 24 medical items and Rosewood list every one. There are 2 x 20ml pods of saline for washing dirt and debris out of eyes and elsewhere, 2 medium dressing bandages with ties, a conforming bandage for a suspected sprained joint, 5 gauze swabs, microporous tape to hold a dressing on, and a foil blanket to keep body warmth in and help combat shock. Then 4 alcohol free cleansing wipes for cleaning a wound, 4 plastic pouches to cover a foot injury and keep it clean, 2 pairs of latex gloves, scissors and tweezers. The box measures approximately 21 x 20.5 x 5cm.

• Contains 24 medical items
• 2 x 20ml pods of saline
• 2 medium dressing bandages with ties, plus a conforming bandage
• 5 gauze swabs, microporous tape, 4 alcohol free cleansing wipes
• Foil blanket, 4 plastic foot pouches, 2 pairs of latex gloves
• Scissors and tweezers, in a box of approximately 21 x 20.5 x 5cm

A kit is not a skill, and nothing in this box is a treatment. Every item here is for cleaning, covering, warming and getting an animal to a vet in one piece - there is nothing in it that mends anything, and putting a bandage on a wound that needs stitching mostly delays the appointment. Find out your own vet's out-of-hours number before you need this box, and read a pet first aid guide on a day when nothing has happened. Rosewood also publish no expiry dates to us for the saline pods or the wipes, so check them on the box and write the date somewhere, because a kit that lives in a boot for four years is a kit full of expired saline.

Who it's for: anyone who walks a dog where there is glass, barbed wire or a long way back to the car, and anyone who has been meaning to put a kit together for a year. At roughly 21 x 20.5 x 5cm it is a boot or cupboard kit, not a pocket one.