What is Advanced First Aid? Train your whole team and promote safety in the building!
These courses will enhance training candidates’ skills in identifying and treating life-threatening emergencies to reduce risks of pre-hospital deaths.
If you’re curious, read further, as we will elaborate on this topic in this article.
Last reviewed: September 2026 — checked against Resuscitation Council UK Guidelines 2025.
Advanced First Aid Course
The accredited Advanced first aid course will give trainers theoretical and practical knowledge.
These are vital for the management in administering safe, effective, and quick-response lifesaving measures.
Moreover, these can give complete assistance in the workplace, especially in remote areas where there’s a need to use emergency equipment and medical teleconsultations.
Advanced programmes are typically delivered over three days. Most providers now put the theory into an e-learning package that you complete before the course, so that the classroom time can be spent almost entirely on practical skills and scenario training. Exact length and content vary by provider and by the risks the course has to cover.
What Is Required for This Advanced First Aid Training?
There is no legal entry requirement for advanced first aid training – the entry criteria are set by the training provider. Most expect candidates to already hold a current workplace qualification such as First Aid at Work, or to have equivalent experience, but some advanced programmes are open to newcomers and offer a First Aid at Work certificate as an add-on. Always check the entry requirements with the provider before you book.
Another major requirement for this program is English fluency. Candidates for this type of training must be able to understand and speak the English language.
Advanced First Aid training courses introduce a systematic way of managing casualties.
First aiders will undergo each program which involves practicals intermixed with scenarios of real situations, including:
- Development of practical skills in using emergency equipment
- Development of first aid skills gained at the emergency level and advanced techniques
- In-depth review of emergency care topics (shock management and basic life support)
Advanced First Aid Course Online
Blended learning – online theory combined with instructor-led classroom training – is an accepted way to deliver workplace first aid training. The Health and Safety Executive confirms this in the 2024 revision of its guidance, L74, and most large providers now run their main first aid courses this way.
However, the total learning time should not be reduced just because part of it happens online.
What does that mean?
Having a course delivered exclusively online, with no face-to-face practical training or assessment, will not meet the requirements set out in the guidance, and any workplace first aid certificate gained that way is not acceptable. The HSE strongly recommends that any part of the syllabus needing a practical demonstration of first aid is assessed by direct observation.
Before you accept a blended course, the HSE expects an employer to satisfy themselves that the learner can use the technology, that the provider supports learners through the online element and has a robust system to prevent identity fraud, that enough time is set aside for classroom learning and practical assessment, and that the e-learning itself is properly assessed.
Here is how the main workplace qualifications are usually structured:
- Emergency Paediatric First Aid – a one-day course (six hours of learning, excluding breaks)
- First Aid at Work – a three-day course, commonly delivered blended as e-learning plus two classroom days
- Paediatric First Aid – a two-day course, often one day of e-learning plus one classroom day
- Emergency First Aid at Work – a one-day course, six hours of learning, excluding breaks
NOTE: Online first aid training DOES NOT replace the need for face-to-face training and assessment if you are learning advanced training for first aid.
Advanced First Aid Course Price
Advanced first aid and pre-hospital trauma programmes are almost always quoted on enquiry rather than sold at a published per-person rate. That is because they are normally bought by an organisation for a whole team, delivered at your own site, and built from modules chosen to match your risks – so the price depends on numbers, location, module mix and any equipment or clinical governance bundled with the training.
For face-to-face course delivery, prices vary by provider and by what is included.
As a benchmark, published per-learner prices for standard workplace first aid qualifications in September 2026 run from roughly £95 to £175 plus VAT for a one-day Emergency First Aid at Work course, and from roughly £195 to £410 plus VAT for a three-day First Aid at Work course, depending on the provider and on whether you choose classroom-only or blended delivery. Advanced trauma programmes sit well above that range. Prices change, so check the current figure on each provider’s own website before you budget.
Most Advanced First Aid Courses
There are two higher courses for immediate medical response.
These are the following:
- Retail Advanced First Aid Programme (RAFA)
- Immediate Emergency Care (IEC) Advanced course
RAFA Course
This 3-day RAFA course is available for non-healthcare professionals. It has interchangeable modules depending on your site-specific risks.
It includes specific modules for burns, paediatrics, penetrating trauma and sudden cardiac arrest, and further modules can be specialised to cater to your specific organisational risks.
Learners complete an e-learning package before they attend, so the classroom days concentrate on practical skills, high-fidelity manikins and scenario work with live casualty actors. The course is benchmarked at Pre-Hospital Emergency Medicine (PHEM) Level C as defined by the Faculty of Pre-Hospital Care. The RAFA Practitioner certificate lasts three years and is renewed through a two-day requalification course, and candidates can add a First Aid at Work certificate for an extra fee.
IEC Advanced
The IEC Advanced course is one of the most advanced immediate medical response and trauma courses available to non-healthcare professionals in the UK. It is normally run as an intensive three-day course, with a five-day option that adds a two-day cascade or train-the-trainer element so an organisation can keep skills refreshed in house.
This course tackles all the skills proposed by the National Fire Chiefs Council and the Faculty of Pre-Hospital Care.
It is designed with Fire & Rescue specialists, police, military and NHS professionals.
How to Choose an Advanced First Aid Course
Advanced first aid is not a regulated title, so the label on its own tells you very little. These are the questions worth asking before you book:
- Does the syllabus follow the Resuscitation Council UK Guidelines 2025? Training materials had to comply with the 2025 guidelines from January 2026, so a course still teaching the previous edition is out of date.
- Does it cover life-threatening bleeding? That is the term the HSE adopted in the 2024 revision of L74, and it expects tourniquets and haemostatic dressings to be taught where a first-aid needs assessment identifies that risk.
- Who issues the certificate, how long is it valid, and what does requalification involve?
- Is there clinical governance behind the programme, and are the interventions taught matched to the equipment you actually hold on site?
- Is every practical skill taught and assessed face to face, by direct observation?
- Does the course sit on top of a workplace first aid qualification, or replace it? An advanced course does not automatically satisfy the Health and Safety (First-Aid) Regulations 1981 – check whether a First Aid at Work or Emergency First Aid at Work certificate is included.
- Has your first-aid needs assessment been reviewed recently? Since 2024 the HSE expects employers to consider mental health in that assessment as well as physical risk.
Conclusion
One benefit of a well-trained first aider is that you’ll be able to teach non-medical personnel how important it is to know about basic life support and possible resources you’ll need.
Having these programs taken and completed by your whole team will ensure safety and security in the workplace.
You can help save lives by choosing this rewarding career!
At Skills Training Group, we run a variety of first aid training courses. Find out more about these courses today.
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