There is a whole lot you can do without risk of spinal injury. Just securing the scene (preventing additional vehicles from hitting the vehicle), calling 911, checking for other hazards, and if safe, approaching and talking to the victim (to see if he's conscious/alert, and to try to calm him down), and if not, ascertaining if the victim is massively bleeding, has airway, breathing, and circulation, is good. If someone's not breathing, or is on fire, or has spurting arterial bleeding (e.g. from a severed leg), the potential risk of aggravating spinal trauma is basically a non-issue. You don't shake the head around, and support it in movement, but enh, it's a question of what's worse. It's not like you need special training to talk to someone who was injured.

I'm mostly used to combat casualties (where you also have to worry about enemy action, unexploded IEDs or UXOs, etc.), but I've responded to a bunch of traffic accidents in other places, including one a few hundred meters from my house on the offramp a couple nights ago. It's not really that hard, and basic first aid/CPR training is something most people should have, especially if you have kids.

(also, if you have a car, and you don't carry a flashlight or two, a blanket, a cellphone, and a seat belt cutter/glass breaker, and ideally a real first aid kit, you're really doing it wrong.)

Check on all except for the blanket, thank you for the reminder. Preparation is half the battle with anything.

Incidentally I found it quite hard to find a 'non-toy' first aid kit. Most companies will sell you a crappy set of contents in a very spiffy looking plastic box, that would be mostly useless in any situation beyond nicking your finger while peeling potatoes.

Yeah, I've never found a pre-assembled first aid kit which is worthwhile -- much better to assemble your own, so you know exactly where everything is and how to use it. I used to keep an IFAK on me and also a larger buttpack-style medical kit to put under a pack.

I'm kind of sad that I lost one of my good Italian army blankets at the vehicle accident the other night -- I didn't want it back after it was covered in a random person's blood and glass, and she was still using it. Annoyingly most of the good surplus sources for heavy wool blankets have gone dry.

I keep a minor-injuries kit for definitive care for minor comfort things (some small bandaids, OTC medications, wet wipes, etc.) separate from an actual trauma kit (well, one in cabin and a bigger one in the trunk) (4-8 israeli dressings, 2 Combat Application Tourniquets, some rolls of gauze, sterile blades, catheter/needle for tension pneumothorax, cpr mask (which I'd only really use on sketchy random people who appear ill, otherwise IMO its a waste of time, although in a bigger kit a BVM would be great), some needles, some nitrile gloves, surgical tape, duct tape, 2 SAM splints, hot and cold packs). Add to that the other normal zombie/earthquake/etc. things (heavy trash bags, crowbar, and trauma-causing implements), and I am really happy to have a car vs. take public transit.

Also, a case or two of water and sports drink (gatorade) is really useful in the car. If nothing else, blankets and a $3 case of bottled water saves a lot of money on road trips and at gas stations.

I fell off of my bike and broke my collar bone a few years back. Up until that point, i was young and naive enough to not be fully aware that not everyone shared the same experiences I had, including basic first aid training from the boy scouts. So when a bystander who saw the crash came over to "help", the first thing he said was "we have to get you out of the street", and he started trying to pick me up and drag me. I had to scream at him before he would listen and put me down. I remember being completely flabbergasted that he had done the one thing they tell you to never do -- try to move an injured person. I had to explain to him that if I had a neck injury, he could have just paralyzed me.