Do-it-yourself battlefield medicine saves lives

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CHICAGO (AP) — When Army Ranger Leroy Petry’s hand was blown off

by a grenade as he was saving his comrades in battle, he knew just

what to do. He used his remaining hand to twist a tourniquet around

his arm to avoid bleeding to death.

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Sgt. 1st Class Petry, awarded the Medal of Honor last month, was

with a regiment trained in do-it-yourself battlefield treatment.

That kind of quick care on the field led to a 92 percent survival

rate for the regiment over more than seven years, a study

found.

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Of the 32 deaths, just one had wounds considered potentially

survivable, in this case massive bleeding. That Ranger died from

post-surgery complications.

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The study found a 3 percent death rate from potentially survivable

causes in the 75th Regiment between October 2001 and April 2010.

That compares with a 24 percent rate in a previously reported set

of U.S. military deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan, which included

troops who didn’t have the Ranger-style training, the study authors

said.

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Petry “is a prime example of how this works,” said lead author Dr.

Russ Kotwal of the Special Operations Command at Fort Bragg, N.C.

President Barack Obama awarded Petry his medal in a ceremony where

he shook the Ranger’s new robotic hand.

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Historically, about 90 percent of combat-related deaths have

occurred in the field, before troops reached a medical facility.

Mindful of that, the Rangers adopted a new approach more than a

decade ago, focusing on certain types of injuries, after a review

of casualties in previous wars.

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The idea is straightforward: There aren’t enough doctors or medics

to treat battlefield wounds, so Rangers must be equipped with their

own first aid devices and trained to use them.

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“If you can’t do it to yourself, then you grab somebody to do it

for you,” Kotwal said.

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The study, published Monday in Archives of Surgery, details the

Rangers’ approach, which also has been adopted in some other parts

of the military.

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The Rangers are part of the Army’s Special Operations Command. They

undergo training over a couple of days in how to treat battlefield

wounds.

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The focus is immediately treating the three main types of

“potentially survivable” injuries: extreme bleeding from arms or

legs, collapsed lungs from chest trauma, and airway blockage,

including blood or tissue caught in the throat.

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Soldiers are equipped with tourniquets, special wound dressings and

needles used to treat major chest injuries. Their medical training

is considered “as important as shooting,” said Dr. John Holcomb,

the study’s senior author.

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“To really inculcate this training and mentality into the entire

regiment takes a couple of years,” Holcomb said.

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Master Sgt. Harold Montgomery, a medic, said he’s “an absolute

believer” in the approach.

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He said he has seen non-medics administer treatment without qualms.

“The one time you see them flustered” is treating severe chest

wounds, which can cause air to fill the chest cavity and collapse

the lungs. Treatment “is sticking a big needle into somebody’s

chest” to deflate the air build-up. “It can quickly save a life,”

but non-medics sometimes seek assurance from more medically

experienced comrades about when it’s really needed, Montgomery

said.

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Causes of injuries and deaths examined in the study included

explosive devices and gunshot wounds, which accounted for half of

the deaths. Most battlefield treatment focused on controlling

bleeding and non-medical personnel applied 42 percent of the

tourniquets.

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The approach studied teaches soldiers “to take a deep breath” in

the middle of combat and “fall back on a basic set of concepts and

maneuvers shown by this study to increase survival of those

wounded,” said Dr. Todd Rasmussen, an Air Force surgeon who is the

deputy commander of the U.S. Army Institute of Surgical Research in

San Antonio, Texas.

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It is being adopted in some military settings and by police in

nonmilitary settings, “to overcome the chaos of these types of

events, whether it is an explosion on the battlefield or a live

shooter at a mall,” Rasmussen said. He was not involved in the

study.

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Online:

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Archives of Surgery: 

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“-blank”>http://www.archsurg.com

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AP Medical Writer Lindsey Tanner can be reached at

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