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After an pretty severe accident I had this weekend (lucky I'm alive) I think it would be rather prudent to have a good trauma bag around. I like the idea of something like the STOMP portable hospital kind of deal from cheaper than dirt, but I hear it has shortcomings due to price and not enough of the 'important' stuff. Where would I start after the bag itself? Or would it be better just to get the thing and add/remove as needed?
The training is more important than the bag. Get schooled up first, then start spending money on gear. Most of the stuff I've bought has been through
http://www.chinookmed.com/cgi-bin/category/medical_kits
Chinook medical in Durango.
Both North American Rescue Products and Tactical Medical Solutions also offer a good line up.
http://www.narescue.com/
https://www.tacmedsolutions.com/store/index.php
I have first aid training, as do the people I primarily hang out with. I don't currently have any kit or supplies, and I like the buy once philosophy.
Affording the whole thing is going to take a while anyway, and I do intend to study some better first aid.
Even if I can't use it all, it would be nice to tell someone who can that what they need is in the trunk.
I have some training and have several friends with more. I carry a stomp to the range or dangerous events. a much smaller kit lives in my truck.
My wife is a Registered Nurse who's worked in just about every imaginable area of medicine, including the ER and surgery, so I asked her to take the lead on assembling our kits. Because of her experience, we pretty much know that if TSHTF she'll be the closest thing to a doctor around, so we want to make sure she's equipped to handle most anything. We decided to start with good basic kits with room for expansion, then add to them.
For our Get-Home-Bags, we went with these: http://www.amazon.com/299-Piece-Soft...1927292&sr=8-1
For our hunker-down location, we went much larger and got one of these http://www.amazon.com/First-Aid-Kit-...1927359&sr=1-5 and added to it a military surgical kit with instruments and sutures. I've kept adding to it too with things like a Pulse Oximeter and 2 lead EKG machine, focusing on things they'd have in an ER that can't be easily duplicated with simpler instruments.
Hope this helps.
To echo Mick-Boy - Chinook Med is great.
Another great Colorado Company is Rescue Essentials in Salida. They sell North American Rescue and Tac Med Solutions stuff.
As far as training I have a Casualty Care class coming up in August at Bowers Tactical.
If you (or anyone) want more training I can also provide the Emergency Medical Responder course (this was formally known as First Responder). This is one step below EMT training but much better than basic First Aid training. It is a very good course that provides a great deal of knowledge, skills, and abilities. It is a long class, about 50 hours.