The Aircast Boot

This is the Aircast boot. Now, this is the sort of boot that we put on after someone's come out of plaster, or maybe they've got an injury, which they don't actually need to have full plaster, whereas this will immobilize their ankle. Now, the Aircast boots are... Personally, I've tried other boots, but this, by far, is the best one, the most comfortable one, and gives the most support. The boot itself is very straightforward. They are three key sizes to it, small, medium, and large. And this one's a medium, based on size nine men's, but you can look and see which sizes you need. The boot itself is solid in its construction and the reason it's better than a lot of the others is there are three independent air chambers on this one that support and hold your foot and it keeps it immobile.

Just to oversee what the boot is about. There's two parts to it; there's the front section on the front here, which you put your foot in, to start with, then you put this on. Three velcro straps, so that the straps at the front here hold the piece just above your foot, then you can work on the next one, hold it mid in the top. The key thing with these boots is the way that you can put air into them. Now, other makes we've looked at have the ones in the front, and I tried them and they were really uncomfortable. With this, the air is in three independent pockets. What you need to do is you gotta pump it here and you got a dial here. You start it off on one, so once your foot is fully strapped in in place, set it on one, pump the button until you feel it so it's firm. Don't overdo it. Just feel it so it's firm. Then switch the knob round to the two section and pump, and then three and pump, and finally, you must block it off, so you put it on to the full section, we've got a little picture of a padlock on.

And basically, number one is for the right hand side, number two is the left hand side, and number three is the back. As you put this on, you'll feel it tightening up. Now, you could do this for somebody else, but you need to be talking to them the whole time to make sure that they feel it's comfortable. These are designed to be weight-bearing. Some people will be able to weight-bear, other won't, but it would depend on the injury, really. The Aircast boot is not really something that you keep in a first aid kit. It would be something that has been put on or prescribed through by a doctor. However, there may be certain situations in remote side where you do need to splint an ankle or you need to keep a foot injury protected. Something like this could be very, very useful.

Finally, once the boot needs to be removed, you can't just undo the velcro and take it off, but you also need to take the air out of it. To do this, all you need to do is turn it through to the three section, and push this little button here, and that will release the air and you'll hear the air coming out, then move it to two, push the button, and one, push the button. Now all the air chambers are empty. If you forget to let the air out, you can actually just squeeze the air chambers with your finger pushed on the button then all the air would come out. Inside, just to keep it clean, you can wipe the outside, over, the insides, you can clean these off best you can with a cloth. And one other thing to make it more comfortable inside, you can just use a normal sock, but it does come with a long sock, which is quite good because it keeps your foot warm, it keeps it protected, and also, it stops the boot actually rubbing on your skin.