Photo By Douglas Stutz | Focusing through the blur of battle…hospital corpsmen assigned to Navy Medicine...... read more read more
The sound of explosions tore through the morning calm and shredded a squad on patrol.
Man down meant corpsman up.
The faux firefight was proving ground for hospital corpsmen assigned to Navy Medicine Readiness Training Command Bremerton to hone their Tactical Combat Casualty Care abilities in an austere combat environment.
TCCC is an operational necessity for all corpsmen and is specifically designed to simulate the unique challenges and conditions on the field of battle in handling traumatic injuries.
“TCCC is a requirement because we are the medical assets for the Marine Corps. We are the first line of defense and are privileged to be the ones to save our brothers and sisters so they can return home to their families and friends,” said Hospital Corpsman 1st Class (Fleet Marine Force qualified) Austin Santistevan, Urgent Care Clinic leading petty officer and course instructor.
The week-long classroom and field training provided approximately 24 hospital corpsmen with knowledge-based instruction, followed by hands-on technique on how to provide emergency medical support and evacuation during a simulated combat environment.
“The reason we teach and practice TCCC is to save the greatest number of lives possible by doing the greatest amount of good for the greatest number of people. The only way that is achieved is if we are consistently lethal with the TCCC algorithm. Knowing the TCCC algorithm and being able to perform a patient assessment thoroughly every time, as fast as possible, and as efficiently as possible, is the reason we exist as corpsman in the Role I [initial, immediate medical care at the point of injury],” explained Santistevan.
The applied Navy TCCC algorithm focuses on injury severity, from life threatening needs to non-urgent care. The acronym MARCH - constantly stressed until it’s muscle memory – stands for massive hemorrhage, airway, respirations, circulation, and head/hypothermia.
“The algorithm for treating a casualty is to find out what the injuries are, determine what is going to first kill that casualty, treat expeditiously and effectively,” stressed Santistevan. “And always reassess.”
Santistevan and other instructors demanded rapid response, prompt assessments, and precise applications from the students. Hesitancy and uncertainty were considered opponents as much as enemy combatants.
“We must constantly train and certify, and ensure we are pushing out the most up to date curriculum to our instructors as well as our students,” Santistevan said.
The TCCC students learned how to handle primary and secondary patient assessment, administer cardiopulmonary resuscitation, shock recognition, spinal stabilization, casualty movement, airway management, hemorrhage control, chest needle decompression, applying splinting and pressure dressings, and more.
Santistevan’s goal is for his instruction to make all his corpsmen well versed in TCCC to also become force multipliers when it comes to additional battlefield medicine support.
“We are the steppingstone for medicine to make it to our Marines. In order for them to help us save lives and expand our medical coverage we must first be a sponge ourselves. We teach TCCC to our Marines when we are integrated into their units,” said Santistevan.
An established hallmark of military medicine during Operation Enduring Freedom [Oct. 7, 2001 – December 28, 2014] and Operation Iraqi Freedom [March 20, 2003 – December 15, 2011] was what became known as the golden hour, a 60-minute window to rapidly get critically injured personnel to a higher echelon of care to drastically improve their survival odds.
Much discussion amongst military planners and medical care experts warns that process - and the shortened time frame – will not be relevant in future conflict across the vastness of the Indo-Pacific theater of operation.
Santistevan notes that modified training segment(s) are geared towards corpsmen realizing they might have to tend for wounded entrusted in their care for upwards of multiple days, far beyond that 60 minute timeframe.
“We used to live by the golden hour. But with expected conflicts, we have to get comfortable holding our patients for 24, 72 or even 96 hours before transfer to the next echelon of care is even an option,” acknowledged Santistevan.
“We have integrated prolonged casualty care into the curriculum at some of the operational units. I like to think of PCC as Role 1.5 or Role I-plus,” continued Santistevan. “It is really that step between the TCCC point of injury care and the Navy Role II [with advanced surgical and intensive care capabilities].
According to Santistevan, the PCC program is designed to build upon existing TCCC training. Corpsmen are taught such skills as chest tube procedure, finger thoracostomies, calculating medication drip rates, wound management and burn care, more complex medications and other doses and uses for the medications they already carry and more.
“It really is an amazing course and invaluable. It can also be very challenging and demanding, which is also why TCCC is absolutely necessary and essential,” said Santistevan, pointedly adding that his goal teaching TCC is for all corpsmen in the course to how to keep their casualty alive to get them to a higher echelon of care.
“Our Marines and warfighters depend on their doc to have their backs,” said Santistevan.
| Date Taken: | 05.13.2025 |
| Date Posted: | 05.13.2025 12:22 |
| Story ID: | 497828 |
| Location: | BREMERTON , WASHINGTON, US |
| Web Views: | 119 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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