Workplace procedures — what your workplace expects you to do.

Why workplace procedures matter

Every Australian workplace that meets the threshold for designated first aiders is required, under the Work Health and Safety Act and the First Aid Code of Practice, to have written first-aid procedures. These tell workers, contractors, visitors and the first aiders themselves how an incident is meant to flow from "something has happened" to "the incident is closed and documented".

The clinical layer — what you actually do at the side of the casualty — comes from ANZCOR (see the ARC guidelines chapter). The procedural layer — who calls, who writes, who tells the manager, who tells the regulator — comes from your workplace. Both have to work together for the response to actually be effective. A first aider who knows the clinical protocols inside out but doesn't know where their workplace's first-aid kit lives, or how to summon emergency services from a particular site, is only half-prepared.

What workplace first-aid procedures typically cover

A workplace first-aid procedure document — sometimes called a first-aid plan, first-aid management procedure, or emergency response procedure — usually covers some or all of the following:

• The roster of designated first aiders — names, training currency, contact numbers, locations on site, hours of availability.
• Where the first-aid kits and AED are located, who is responsible for restocking and checking them, and the inspection schedule.
• Where the first-aid room is (if the workplace is large enough to require one), who has access, and what it contains.
• How to summon a first aider — the internal phone number, the radio channel, the PA announcement, the duress button. In some workplaces this is a "First Aid Code Blue" PA call; in others it's a simple "call extension 9".
• How to summon emergency services — what number to dial (000 from a mobile, sometimes a different number from a landline that routes through switchboard), what address to give, who meets the ambulance at the gate.
• The incident-reporting workflow — what form to fill in, where to file it, who gets a copy, what timeframe.
• Notifiable incident reporting — the legal duty to notify the WHS regulator within hours of certain serious incidents (deaths, serious injuries, dangerous incidents). Covered in detail below.
• Post-incident debrief and support — what happens for the first aider, the casualty, witnesses, and the manager after the immediate incident is over.
• Workplace-specific hazards — the things at this particular site that the generic ANZCOR guidelines don't cover (the chemicals on the SDS shelf, the working-at-heights risks, the confined spaces).

If your workplace's procedures don't include some of these, that is the kind of gap to flag through the health and safety committee or your HSR.

Day one as a workplace first aider — questions to ask

When you first take on a designated first aider role at a workplace — or arrive at a new site with an existing certificate — there are a small number of questions you should answer in the first day or two:

1. Where are the first-aid kits, and where is the AED? Walk to each of them. Open them. Know what's inside.
2. Who else is on the first-aid roster? Names, locations, hours. Are there enough of you for the rosters that matter?
3. What's the workplace's procedure for raising the first-aid alarm? Is it a phone number, a radio channel, a PA, a duress button? Who hears it?
4. What's the procedure for calling 000? From this site, on this network, with this address. Where do you direct the ambulance to enter?
5. Who gets notified after an incident? Manager? HR? HSR? Site supervisor? In what order?
6. Where is the incident register, and what form do I fill in? Who reviews completed forms?
7. What is the workplace-specific hazard set? A walk through the site with your manager or HSR is the cheapest investment you can make in your own competence.
8. Where are the SDS folders for any chemicals on site?
9. What's the post-incident debrief process? Is there an EAP? Is there a peer support arrangement?
10. What's the workplace's policy on giving casualty's own medication (e.g. their own EpiPen, their own salbutamol)? And on calling an ambulance — is it discretionary or mandatory for certain categories of incident?

Most workplaces will be glad you asked. The ones that aren't are sending you a signal about how seriously they take the role.

The incident register

Every workplace incident — every one, no matter how minor — should be recorded in the workplace incident register on the day it happens. The register is the legal documentary record that the incident occurred, and it is the first thing an inspector, an insurer, a coroner or a workers' compensation case manager will ask for.

A typical incident record includes:

• Date and time of the incident.
• Location within the workplace.
• Names of the casualty, the first aider, and any witnesses.
• What happened — a brief, factual description, written in the casualty's words where possible. Stick to facts; do not record opinions about who was at fault.
• Injury or illness observed and the casualty's stated symptoms.
• First aid given — what you did, what equipment you used, what the casualty's response was.
• Outcome — sent home, sent to GP, taken to hospital by ambulance, returned to work.
• Follow-up actions — referral to health and safety committee, hazard control put in place, equipment maintenance.
• Signatures — first aider, casualty (where possible), manager.

The register is confidential health information and is governed by the Australian Privacy Principles (see the privacy chapter). It is not a noticeboard. Access is restricted to people with a legitimate need to know.

Notifiable incidents — the regulator clock

Some incidents are notifiable under the WHS Act. If a workplace incident falls into one of the notifiable categories, the PCBU (your employer) is legally required to notify the relevant state or territory WHS regulator immediately, in addition to anything else they do. The categories are roughly:

• The death of a person (worker, contractor, visitor) at the workplace, or as a result of work activity.
• A serious injury or illness — broadly, an injury requiring immediate hospital admission and treatment, amputation, serious head/eye/spinal injury, serious burns, electric shock causing unconsciousness, infection contracted through specific occupational exposures.
• A dangerous incident — a near-miss involving uncontrolled escape of a hazardous substance, electric shock, structural collapse, fall from height, implosion or explosion, even if no-one was hurt.

The first aider's job is not to make the notification themselves — that is the PCBU's legal duty. The first aider's job is to recognise that the incident may be notifiable, document everything carefully, and escalate immediately to the manager or HSR so the notification clock starts running. Get the wrong call and the regulator will hear about it from someone else; documenting cleanly and escalating fast is how you avoid that.

After a notifiable incident, the scene should not be disturbed (other than to render first aid, make the area safe, or preserve evidence) until the regulator authorises it or 24 hours has passed. This is a legal duty on the PCBU and is something a first aider should know about so they don't accidentally clean up evidence.

After the ambulance leaves — the things people forget

The clinical incident is over the moment the paramedics take the casualty. The procedural incident is just beginning. Things that need to happen in the hours and days after:

1. Notify next of kin — usually the manager's job, not the first aider's, but you may be the one with the casualty's emergency contact details on the scene.
2. Document the incident in the register while it's fresh.
3. Restock the first-aid kit so it's ready for the next incident. Whoever opens the kit has a responsibility to leave it ready for the next person.
4. Decontaminate any reusable equipment and clean up any body-fluid spill (see the infection control chapter).
5. Brief the manager and HSR on what happened.
6. Escalate to the regulator if notifiable — via the PCBU.
7. Debrief the first-aid team and any witnesses — short, structured, focused on facts and emotional state. The rescuer stress chapter covers this in detail.
8. Follow up with the casualty — within a few days, as appropriate. Sometimes the workplace does this through HR; sometimes the first aider does it personally.
9. Review the incident through the health and safety committee and consider whether any control needs to be updated.

A good workplace runs through this list as a matter of routine after every significant incident. A great workplace runs through it after minor ones too.

Your reporting duty as a worker

Under the WHS Act, every worker — not just first aiders — has a legal duty to:

• Take reasonable care for their own health and safety, and the health and safety of others affected by their work.
• Comply with reasonable instructions from the PCBU.
• Cooperate with any reasonable workplace health and safety policy or procedure.
• Notify the PCBU of any hazard, incident, or near-miss.

That last point is the one that catches workers out — the duty to notify is on you, not just on your manager. If you see a hazard and don't report it, and an incident later occurs, the question of "did you raise this?" is a question you may have to answer.

The good news is that the same Act gives workers strong protection against retaliation for raising safety concerns. A PCBU cannot lawfully discipline a worker for reporting a hazard or refusing to perform unsafe work. If you ever feel pressured not to raise something, that pressure is itself a breach of the Act, and the regulator wants to hear about it.

Workplace policy on top of ANZCOR — when they conflict

In almost all cases, workplace policy and ANZCOR clinical guidance fit together cleanly. Workplace policy specifies the procedural wrap-around (who calls, who writes, who's notified); ANZCOR specifies the clinical action (what you do at the casualty). Both layers complement each other.

When they appear to conflict, the rule is the one from the peak body guidelines chapter: a more detailed, casualty-specific instruction can refine a broader one as long as it doesn't contradict it. A workplace policy that says "always call an ambulance for any seizure on site" is a refinement of the ANZCOR guideline (which calls for an ambulance only for first seizures, prolonged seizures, and several other specific situations) and is fine — it just adds more cautious behaviour. A workplace policy that says "do not call an ambulance without manager approval" is a contradiction of the clinical duty to call when needed and is not lawful. In that situation, call the ambulance, document everything, and escalate.

What not to do

• Do not assume workplace procedures will be obvious — find them on day one and read them.
• Do not wait until after an incident to learn where the kit lives.
• Do not clean up the scene of a serious incident before the manager or regulator has seen it.
• Do not skip the incident register because the injury "looked minor" — minor injuries become major workers' comp claims.
• Do not follow a workplace policy that contradicts your clinical duty of care. Escalate.
• Do not forget to debrief your team after a serious incident — psychological injury is as real as physical injury and is just as much a workplace hazard.

Workplace procedures are not red tape. They are the thing that makes a single trained first aider into a functioning workplace first-aid system — connected to the ambulance, the manager, the regulator, the register, and the next person who walks through the door. ANZCOR teaches the chest compressions; the workplace teaches the rest of the response.

— Safe Work Australia, Model Code of Practice: First Aid in the Workplace