Use this skill to keep a badly wounded friend from dying, to help others recover faster from wounds, to keep your friend from succumbing to a wyvern’s sting or to treat disease.
Check: The DC and effect depend on the task you attempt.
| Task | Heal DC |
|---|---|
| First aid | 15 |
| Long-term care | 15 |
| Treat wound from caltrop, spike growth or spike stones | 15 |
| Treat poison | Poison’s save DC |
| Treat disease | Disease’s save DC |
| Makeshift Bandage | 12 |
| Extended Aid | 20 |
| Quicken recovery | 50 |
| Perfect recovery | 100 |
First Aid: You usually use first aid to save a dying character. If a character has negative hit points and is losing hit points (at the rate of 1 per round, 1 per hour, or 1 per day), you can make him or her stable. A stable character regains no hit points but stops losing them.
Long-Term Care: Providing long-term care means treating a wounded person for a day or more. If your Heal check is successful, the patient recovers hit points or ability score points (lost to ability damage) at twice the normal rate: 2 hit points per level for a full 8 hours of rest in a day, or 4 hit points per level for each full day of complete rest; 2 ability score points for a full 8 hours of rest in a day, or 4 ability score points for each full day of complete rest.
You can tend as many as six patients at a time. You need a few items and supplies (bandages, salves and so on) that are easy to come by in settled lands. Giving long-term care counts as light activity for the healer. You cannot give long-term care to yourself.
Treat Wound from Caltrop, Spike Growth or Spike Stones: A creature wounded by stepping on a caltrop moves at one-half normal speed. A successful Heal check removes this movement penalty.
A creature wounded by a spike growth or spike stones spell must succeed on a Reflex save or take injuries that reduce his speed by one-half1. Another character can remove this penalty by taking 10 minutes to dress the victim’s injuries and succeeding on a Heal check against the spell’s save DC.
1 Note: The SRD document contains an error and indicates that the speed should be reduced by one-third, instead of one-half. This error was corrected in the 3.5 edition of the Player’s Handbook, but the error is contained in the 3.0 edition and in the Pathfinder 1 Core Rulebook.
Treat Poison: To treat poison means to tend a single character who has been poisoned and who is going to take more damage from the poison (or suffer some other effect). Every time the poisoned character makes a saving throw against the poison, you make a Heal check. The poisoned character uses your check result or his or her saving throw, whichever is higher.
Treat Disease: To treat a disease means to tend a single diseased character. Every time he or she makes a saving throw against disease effects, you make a Heal check. The diseased character uses your check result or his or her saving throw, whichever is higher.
Makeshift Bandage: You can apply a makeshift bandage to a fallen creature. If you are successful, the target automatically stabilizes 2 rounds later unless he stabilizes normally, receives magical healing, or sustains a new injury before that time. If you fail the check by 5 or more, the target loses 1 hit point instead. You must declare whether you are using the Heal skill to attempt a makeshift bandage or to perform first aid prior to making your roll.
Extended Aid: You can help an unconscious creature return to consciousness more quickly. If the check succeeds, the unconscious creature in your care wakes in 1 hour.
Quicken Recovery (Epic): You can allow a character to regain hit points in a single hour as if you had provided long-term care for a full day (2 or 4 hit points per level, based on activity). You can quicken the recovery of up to six patients at a time. No character’s recovery can be quickened more than once per day (even by different healers).
Perfect Recovery (Epic): You can allow a character to regain hit points in a single hour as if you had provided long-term care for a full week (2 or 4 hit points per level per day, based on activity). You can use perfect recovery on up to six patients at a time. No character’s recovery can be perfected more than once per day, nor can perfect recovery and quicken recovery both be used on the same patient in the same day (even by different healers).
Determine Cause of Death: You can use the Heal skill to determine what killed a dead creature. The difficulty of this task depends on the nature of the death itself, as shown on the table below.
| Cause of Death | DC |
|---|---|
| Physical wounds | 0 |
| Environmental (fire, suffocation, etc.) | 5 |
| Spell with visible effects | 10 |
| Poison | 15 |
| Spell with no visible effects | 20 |
Each day that passes between the time of the creature’s death and the time the examination is made increases the DC of the Heal check to determine the cause of death by 5.
Action: Providing first aid, treating a wound or treating poison is a standard action. Treating a disease or tending a creature wounded by a spike growth or spike stones spell takes 10 minutes of work. Providing long-term care requires 8 hours of light activity.
Making a Heal check to determine the cause of a creature’s death takes 10 minutes.
Try Again: Varies. Generally speaking, you can’t try a Heal check again without proof of the original check’s failure. You can always retry a check to provide first aid, assuming the target of the previous attempt is still alive.
Making a Heal check to determine the cause of death can be retried, but it takes 10 more minutes for each check.
Special: A character with the Self-Sufficient feat gets a +2 bonus on Heal checks.
A healer’s kit gives you a +2 circumstance bonus on Heal checks.
Source: Player’s Handbook (Page 75), Complete Adventurer (Page 101), Epic Level Handbook (Page 41)