On another thread "Carried but not used" this prescient comment from Wildman800 was made:



This brings up an interesting point:
What type of gloves do you buy for your first-aid kit?

The usual choice is between latex, PVC, silicone and nitrile. Each has its advantages.

Latex examination gloves are the most common. They are cheap, if bought in bulk, and effective for short-term limited use in a controlled environment. They are also delicate, subject to degradation by many common chemicals and they self-destruct in storage.

My preference is for the disposable nitrile gloves, usually in blue or purple for some reason. These have several substantial advantages over the latex variety:

They are less likely to cause allergic reactions or a rash on people. Even people with moderate latex allergies can often get by with them. Even though some of them actually contain some amount of latex protein. YMMV.

They are more a little more resistant to tearing or puncture compared to latex.

Compared to latex gloves nitrile gloves are much more resistant to common chemicals. Many solvents, petroleum compounds and the petrolatum base used in many salves and ointments attack natural latex. In a disaster or crash site gasoline diesel, petroleum based agricultural chemicals can be expected cover virtually everything. Nitrile stands up to petroleum products.

They resist exposure to UV and sunlight far longer than latex. In the sunny south latex darkens and weakens after a short exposure to the noonday sun. Nitrile is largely immune to sunshine.

Nitrile stores much longer compared to latex. In part because it resists exposure to oxygen and ozone.

Disposable nitrile gloves are cheap and readily available.

Nitrile, PVC or silicone surgical gloves are all, IMHO, much better than latex. Silicone based gloves, marked as 100% latex free, are available but they are typically much more expensive than the alternatives. This additional cost may be justified if you, or the people you expect to treat, are extremely allergic to latex. PVC gloves are usually also 100% latex free and are much cheaper.

On the there hand high quality silicone surgical gloves sized properly to the wearer give the finest feel and greatest amount of manual dexterity available in a glove. Some surgeons claim that they actually are better than wearing no gloves because the light even pressure on their fingers increases their endurance. Much like support hose make the legs feel better by keeping the blood from pooling.

PVC gloves are typically used by food handling operations. They are fairly tough, cheap, chemical resistant and they hold up well in storage and in sunlight. Down side is that they don't stretch and have to be worn over-sized to get them on. The usual one-size-fits-all pair is pretty loose and once you sweat a little inside it can be like working from inside a water balloon as they slide around on the fingers annoyingly. Good gloves but being so loose they seem to snag more often.

Also some consideration might due to cases of hard use and more durable alternatives to disposable gloves. For extreme hard use pair of leather gloves worn over disposable gloves can vastly increase the resistance to abrasion and puncture of any gloves while maintaining barrier protection. If you need fine touch you can remove the bulky leather outers and maintain biological or chemical protection for yourself. Cheap but effective leather work gloves are often available for a bit more than a dollar a pair. Cheap enough that they can be seen as highly expendable, if not entirely disposable.

A larger medical kit might also benefit from inclusion of a couple of pairs of cuffed industrial PVC or nitrile gloves. These are much more resistant to chemicals, abuse, wear, and abrasion. They can also be cleaned and reused many times so, over the long-haul, after all the disposable gloves are gone you still have something to work with. They don't fit as tightly as the disposable gloves and they can consequently make fine work more difficult but they don't flop around like the worse of the over-sized disposable PVC gloves. Many have tapered fingers so you still have a good amount of feel and dexterity with the fingertips.

With time and effort most people can adapt to these. Remember that through the 40s fairly thick industrial gloves were used in surgery. They were all they had. Only later would the thin disposable gloves become available.

Also, as anyone who has used them in an emergency can tell you, you need to carry many pairs of disposable gloves. Even more if your using latex gloves. You are going to be going through many pairs. The typical first-aid kit only has one or two pairs. Better than nothing but if your going to carry disposable gloves think of a ten pairs as a minimum for anything more than a pocket-sized first-aid kit. More if possible.

IMHO a good selection for a large first-aid kit might be two-dozen disposable nitrile gloves, two pairs leather work gloves, two pairs cuffed industrial rubber gloves in PVC or nitrile.

Edited for spelling and syntax.