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    ‘Dragon’ Battalion soldiers tighten up on tourniquet proficiency

    ‘Dragon’ Battalion soldiers tighten up on tourniquet proficiency

    Courtesy Photo | Staff Sgt. Juan Pepi, rear, a non-commissioned officer with 1st Battalion, 63rd Armor...... read more read more

    BAGHDAD, IRAQ

    07.07.2011

    Courtesy Story

    2nd Brigade Combat Team, 1st Infantry Division Public Affairs

    By Staff Sgt. Justin Phemister
    2nd Advise and Assist Brigade, 1st Infantry Division

    BAGHDAD—Soldiers with 1st “Dragon” Battalion, 63rd Armor Regiment, 2nd Advise and Assist Brigade, 1st Infantry Division, United States Division – Center participated in a medic-led advanced tourniquet application course over two days at Camp Liberty, Iraq, June 30-July 1.

    The course challenged soldiers with the Dragon Battalion to apply combat application tourniquets, broadly referred to as a CAT, under difficult circumstances.

    The CAT has made tourniquet application user-friendly to the point that soldiers could apply it one-handed to their own injury if not too severely wounded.

    “When you add in armor, gear, nerves and a scared, writhing patient, you’ll need to have had a lot of practice to even have a chance of applying one effectively,” said Sgt. 1st Class Sean Bach, battalion senior medic with 1st Bn. 63rd Armor Regt. and a Fort Worth, Texas, native.

    Nearly every member of the Dragon Battalion was required to quickly and effectively apply tourniquets onto a wide variety of simulated injuries being portrayed by soldiers simulating the noise and shifting of a wounded patient across several scenarios.

    The most common and most difficult scenario that soldiers would need these skills is in the aftermath of an improvised explosive device attack on a vehicle convoy, said Bach.

    “Unfortunately, this is the reality of the conflict we’re in,” Bach said. “Casualties inside a vehicle cause all sorts of complications for first responders, and soldiers need to be ready to think outside the box.”

    “Outside the box” thinking can mean asking a wounded soldier, who was not incapacitated, to help in applying his own CAT or stabilizing the gunner, who can be harder for first responders to reach.

    “The first group [doing the training] treated the casualties right where they sat [in their vehicles] and took a long time to reach the gunner,” said Pfc. Travis Amstutz, a tactical operations center soldier with 1st Bn., 63rd Armor Regt. and a Norman, Okla., native. “During the [next iteration], I was acting as the wounded gunner this time and I was treated in less than a minute.”

    The class was an eye-opener for many of the soldiers and leaders of the Dragon Battalion.

    “The simplicity of the device can be off-putting,” Bach said. “A soldier will try it once or twice and think, ‘Oh, this is easy,’ but in reality, it takes a lot of practice to master.”

    The importance of stopping bleeding—and the realization that the process is as difficult as it is necessary—has led to the practice of tourniquet application becoming a part of the Dragon Battalion’s pre-combat checks and inspections. In addition, every soldier was told to carry a CAT in the left ankle pocket of their uniform at all times.

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    NEWS INFO

    Date Taken: 07.07.2011
    Date Posted: 07.07.2011 09:50
    Story ID: 73349
    Location: BAGHDAD, IQ

    Web Views: 185
    Downloads: 0

    PUBLIC DOMAIN