United Kingdom
Heat exhaustion and heatstroke
Use at your own risk. For education and research only, not medical advice. Check the numbers and rules for the country you are in. They change. Before you rely on these cards, have a medical professional or a fire safety specialist review them. Disclaimer
Do this first
Get the person out of the heat and lay them down. Cool them with water and moving air, and give sips of water if they are fully awake.
Heat harms in two stages. Heat exhaustion, with pale, sweaty skin, weakness and nausea, still responds to shade, water and rest. Heatstroke, with hot skin and a confused or unconscious mind, is an emergency, and the damage depends on how fast the person is cooled.
Step by step
- Move them to shade or a cool room, lay them down and raise the legs slightly.
- Remove excess clothing and cool the skin. Spray or sponge with water and fan them, and put cold packs wrapped in cloth on the neck, armpits and groin.
- If they are fully awake, give water or a sports drink in steady sips, not litres at once.
- Reassess after thirty minutes. Heat exhaustion should clearly improve. If it does not, treat it as heatstroke and call 999.
- For heatstroke, meaning hot skin with confusion, staggering, seizure or fading consciousness, call 999 immediately and say heatstroke.
- Cool hard while you wait, using the fastest safe method you have. For a fit young person that is immersion in cool water up to the neck. For everyone else it is continuous water and fanning.
- If they become unresponsive but breathe normally, put them in the recovery position, keep cooling and monitor their breathing.
Never do this
- Never give a drink to someone who is confused or drowsy. It can go into the lungs instead of the stomach.
- Never give fever medicines such as paracetamol or ibuprofen for heatstroke. It is not a fever, they do not help, and they load the liver and kidneys.
- Never leave anyone, child, adult or animal, in a parked car. Never assume someone with heatstroke can rest it off.
Call emergency services if
- Hot skin together with confusion, strange behaviour, staggering, seizure or fainting.
- Symptoms that do not clearly improve within thirty minutes of shade, cooling and fluids.
- Heat illness in a child, an older person, or anyone with heart disease or on regular medication.
Common questions
How do I tell exhaustion from heatstroke?
Check how clearly the person thinks. Exhausted people feel miserable but still make sense. Heatstroke changes the person: confusion, aggression, staggering, collapse. Sweating can still be present in heatstroke, so a lack of it proves nothing.
How do I avoid it on a hot day?
Drink before you are thirsty, move work and sport to the morning and evening, wear a hat and light clothing, and check on older neighbours daily. Most heat deaths happen to people who are alone in hot flats.
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Sources and standards
Use at your own risk. For education and research only, not medical advice. Check the numbers and rules for the country you are in. They change. Before you rely on these cards, have a medical professional or a fire safety specialist review them.