The ABC’s on saving a life

Photo By Sgt. Edwin Rodriguez | Sgt. Gordon Welch, Headquarters and Headquarters Company, Special Troops Battalion 7th Sustainment Brigade, explains the explicit details of needle-chest decompression to Pfc. Kadeem Johnson, assigned to the 331st Transportation Company (Causeway), 11th Transportation Battalion, 7th Sus. Bde., during day five of October’s Combat Life Saver course held at Resolute Field, Oct. 12. The 7th Sus. Bde’s medical section facilitates the monthly training for the ‘Resolute Brigade’ and other units on Fort Eustis.  

FORT EUSTIS, VA, UNITED STATES

10.12.2012

Story by Sgt. Edwin Rodriguez 

7th Transportation Brigade (Expeditionary)

FORT EUSTIS, Va. – Soldiers were sprawled all over the ground, agonizing in pain when fellow squad members came to their aid and whisked the ‘injured’ soldiers away to safety. During the ‘rescue’, soldiers were pulled or carried using teams of two or four. The ‘downed’ soldiers were pulled over the area, tossed around like duffel bags filled with leaves in the October sun.

The scenario was real but the wounded Soldiers were all part of the act. Members of the medical section assigned to the 7th Sustainment Brigade conducted a Combat Life Saver course on the grounds of Resolute Field Oct. 3 to certify or re-certify participants assigned on Fort Eustis.

Approximately 30 soldiers participated in this month’s iteration with most participating for their first time, said Spc. Stephen Wisner, an assistance instructor in the course assigned to Headquarters and Headquarters Company, Special Troops Battalion, 7th Sus. Bde.

“Today soldiers took all the classroom and hands on training they received this week and showed us what they learned. This training builds confidence in themselves… what they learn now could someday save a fellow soldier’s life,” said Wisner, originally from Wall Township, N.J.

Soldiers are exposed to the most critical portions of first aid; airway, breathing and circulation, during boot camp. CLS takes those principles, the ‘ABC’s’, to the next level by teaching techniques on how to get give initial care to soldiers during the most vital moments of emergency care.

“The training we gave them showed how to use the important tools in their CLS bag focusing on the ABC’s. They are quick-clot bandages, needle-chest decompressions and nasopharyngeal airway tubes,” said Sgt. Gordon Welch, a medic assigned to HHC, originally from Massillon, Ohio.

“We have trained soldiers from all over Fort Eustis, like from the 128th Aviation Brigade and U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command. Once they are done with today’s qualifications, we will have an After Action Review where they can critic our instruction,” said Welch. “Then qualified or not they will then be released to their units.”

The Army heavily stresses CLS training and recertification for operational readiness stateside or abroad.

“It is a certification they have to keep up every year. It takes two days of review, taking a test portion, and then going through the simulation lanes to recertify,” said Wisner. “If they don’t show enough knowledge during the lanes, they will have to do the course all over again. We want to insure they are fully capable to handle the stresses in the battlefield.“

It is a perishable skill that Pfc. Allison Lowber, 331st Transportation Company (Causeway), 11th Transportation Battalion, feels the instructors are more than willing to share with the group.

“They taught us a good amount. They showed us how to dress wounds, and use chest decompressions,” said Lowber, a Seattle, Wa. native and first timer in the CLS course. “I feel I have learned what I need to learn to be a certified combat life saver.”

“The needle-chest decompression that Lowber mentioned is especially important because a large portion of combat injuries are in the torso. Other items in their CLS bag include Intravenous Therapy, or IV, with saline solution, tourniquets, nerve agent antidotes, and simple items like gauze and bandages,” said Welch.

CLS teaches you what you should have in your bag and what to do in the first seconds of an emergency. You receive a subtle, unspoken form of confidence and resiliency. The soldiers of this course will become part of a conglomerate of soldiers willing and able to put themselves on the line for a fellow soldier in need, a trait which embodies the epitome of the Warrior Ethos.

• Date Taken: 10.12.2012
• Date Posted: 10.19.2012 14:00
• Story ID: 96451
• Location: FORT EUSTIS, VA, US
• Hometown: DOMINICA, DM
• Hometown: MASSILLON, OH, US
• Hometown: SEATTLE, WA, US
• Hometown: WALL TOWNSHIP, NJ, US