• What law applies
• Workplace obligations
  • Employers
  • Workers
  • Workplace amenities and first aid
  • Workplace incidents
  • Training
  • Personal protective equipment
• Plant, machinery and equipment
  • Defining rural plant, machinery and equipment
  • Operating plant, machinery and equipment safely
  • Plant associated risks
• Rural chemicals
  • Using chemicals
  • Storing chemicals
  • Disposing of chemicals and containers
  • Transporting chemicals and dangerous goods
  • Using pesticides
  • Record keeping
  • Rural chemicals guide (PDF, 693 kb)
• Orchard operations
  • Tractors
  • Harvest
• Animal hazards
  • General information
  • Horse handling
  • Cattle handling
  • Sheep handling
  • Shearing
  • Pig handling
  • Diseases from animals
  • Dangerous snakes
  • Distinctive spiders
  • Scorpions and centipedes
• Rural Codes of Practice

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First aid

• Keep the patient still and as calm as possible and bring transport to them.
• Maintain vital functions.
• Immediately apply a pressure immobilisation bandage (in an emergency, clothing strips or pantyhose could be used) over the bite site at the same pressure as for a sprain without blocking circulation.
• Apply a bandage over the top of clothing to as much of the rest of the bitten limb as possible.
• Apply a splint to keep the limb still.
• Seek medical help immediately (for example, call 000).
• If the snake has been killed, bring it with the patient but do not waste time trying to kill it.
• Do not wash the wound.
• Do not use a tourniquet.
• Do not cut or suck the wound.
• Do not give alcohol or food to the patient.

Snake venoms are relatively slow acting but prior consumption of alcohol or drugs, health and age of the victim and allergies may complicate their effects.