Fort McCoy: Casualty triage, evacuation training

Photo By Sgt. Elizabeth Raney | U.S. Army Spc. Matthew Hertzler, a medic in the 491st Area Support Medical Company, gives life saving medical attention to a simulated casualty in the field hospital on Forward Operating Base Independence at Fort McCoy, Wis., June 16, during Global Medic. Global Medic is the premier medical part of the Combat Support Training Exercise hosted by the 78th Training Division, the largest Army Reserve training exercise, with more than 10,000 service members and multinational forces. (U.S. Army photo by Sgt. Beth Raney, 363rd Public Affairs Detachment/Released)  

FORT MCCOY, WI, UNITED STATES

06.19.2015

Story by Sgt. Elizabeth Raney 

364th Theater Public Affairs Support Element

FORT MCCOY, Wis. – Army Reserve Soldiers of the 491st Area Support Medical Company conducted mass casualty training at Forward Operating Base Independence on Fort McCoy, Wisconsin, during Global Medic in June.

Global Medic is the premier medical part of the Combat Support Training Exercise hosted by the 78th Training Division, the largest Army Reserve training exercise, with more than 10,000 service members and multinational forces.

Spc. Joshua Loya, a seasoned combat medic, said the mass casualty scenario, prepare Soldiers for deployment-type experience.

“We had medics, as well as combat lifesaver personnel, assisted with triaging and treating the patient,” said Loya.

“When we get a casualty in, we talk to the medical personnel that treated them and see what the injuries are, what kind of treatments have been given, and what their vitals are,” he said. “Depending if they’re stable or not, and depending on their injuries, they either go to immediate, delayed, or minimal area.”

Loya said, once they arrived their designated area of triage, they received further care and waited for a bed to open up inside.

Sgt. Kevin Butler, a combat medic, said the field hospital only has limited space, so triaging is a necessity to get the right care to the most critically injured.

“We have two trauma beds and four patient hold beds, so the two most critical go inside and we start treatment on them, and make an evacuation decision as to whether they can be kept in patient hold or if they need to be evacuated to a higher level of care,” Butler said.

The triage and medical teams worked together seamlessly to create a quick and efficient system in the treatment area.

Soldiers said they felt the training was beneficial, helping them know what to expect in a deployment environment.

“It’s really important to do field training, because you don’t get this same type of [training] scenario back in garrison because you don’t have all the same elements.” Loya explained.

“You don’t have the dirt, the tent set-up,” said Loya. “Here, we’re able to set-up the tent the way the physician wants it, so we can get used to it, accustomed to how they want to treat [patients] so we can start working in that manner.”

First Lt. Falco Schoeneweiss said not all Soldiers who are in the medical field in the military have similar jobs in their civilian career, making the hands-on training even more important to maintain their skills.

“We can train the individual Soldiers, we can train the medics, we can train the X-ray technicians, on their tasks, but they need to see how everything comes together,” Schoeneweiss continued. “It’s a very tight space to work in, so you need to get in there to see how to work all the little kinks out. By training, you have learned this for a real deployment.”

• Date Taken: 06.19.2015
• Date Posted: 07.05.2015 23:51
• Story ID: 169106
• Location: FORT MCCOY, WI, US