Does anyone know any non-clinical careers that focus on Trauma/First aid? - (Jul/10/2015 )

I’m looking for some other options for careers that deal with trauma, at the moment I’m looking to train up as a physical therapist and then specialize in trauma, as out of all of the clinical careers I’ve looked at physical therapy appealed to me the most as it deals with the topics I’m interested in and is very flexible in the hours and places that you work at. So at the moment physical therapy is defiantly the direction that I’m going to head in, but I would just feel more at ease knowing that if physical therapy didn’t work out that there were other careers that deal with trauma and first aid that I could get into. The main concern I have with physical therapy is that I’m someone who worries and over analyzes things so the Idea of giving people advice on health is something that concerns me as I wouldn’t want to go into work every day worrying about accidentally injuring or killing someone, this is why I didn’t want to go into careers such as nursing or being a doctor as giving medicine seemed like something that I would worry about too much, and as far as I know physical therapists don’t give out medicine. But I might not feel that way at all when I do it so I still want to give it a try and not let fear hold me back.

So I would just like to ask if anyone knows if there are any other careers (not clinical) that deal with trauma and that I could get into now (e.g. becoming a physical therapy assistant whilst I train up). I do enjoy the Idea of creating a recovery plan for someone who has had an injury but for me I’m more interested in how that injury occurred, what damage it had on the body and best way to treat it or researching new ways to treat it, for example I recently found out that spider webs have antibacterial properties and can be used for cuts in the wilderness, researching stuff like this is so interesting to me and I love learning about it. I’ve been looking at careers within science and engineering but I’ve only found careers like forensic science but I haven’t found as many job vacancies for it and I don’t think it’s as flexible as physical therapy in terms of being self-employed and where you work, but It’s defiantly still an option to consider. Also research centers seem like places where I could find out more information as I could volunteer and possibly obtain a job as a research assistant whilst I get a degree related to trauma but I’m not too sure what types of careers this can lead to other then teaching. I was also looking into local charities that deal with first aid as this is also something I’m interested in and have looked into teaching first aid but I’m not too sure if you could do it as a career if it’s on a voluntary basis.

Sorry for the long post, I would really appreciate any suggestions about careers that focus on topics such as trauma, wounds, injury, and first aid, that I could get into now at a low level and work my way up. Like from a physical therapy assistant position to a full on physical therapist position or a research assistant to a full on researcher/scientist.

What about an emergency medical technician/paramedic position - these are usually not doctors/physicians, but focus on very high level first aid