DVIDS Hub works best with JavaScript enabled

Eagle First Responder class

Courtesy Photo | Martin A. Bowen, Q-West firefighter, helps Spc. Mitchell Case, HHC 101st Sustainment...... read more read more

QAYYARAH, IRAQ

12.01.2005

Courtesy Story

DVIDS Hub

SGT RACHEL BRUNE
101ST SUSTAINMENT BDE
1 DECEMBER 2005

Q-WEST BASE COMPLEX, IRAQ -- Combat medics from Company B, 101st Brigade Troops Battalion, brought the 101st Airborne Division's combat lifesaver course, the Eagle First Responder class, to troops and firefighters here Nov. 29 through Dec. 1.

"I think everyone should take the opportunity to learn this," said Pvt.(2) Benjamin Burdick, a Co. B combat medic from Fulton, N.Y. "You'll never know when you're going to have the opportunity to save someone's life."

This class was the second Co. B taught in theater, but the first time Burdick and fellow instructor Spc. Amber Powell, Co. B combat medic, have taught the "battle-stressed" first responder course to civilians.

The four firefighters in the class provide fire protection capabilities on Q-West through Wackenhut Services, Inc., which stations firefighters all over Iraq.

"Being able to work with the Soldiers is a plus," said Wes "Cookie" Cook, WSI firefighter from Lima, Ohio. As firefighters, he and his crew are trained as first responders to give medical aid.

"I would say they gave us new ways to treat wounds and injuries quickly, as well as a really swift patient assessment," said Cook.

That patient assessment, also known as a primary survey, consists of checking for circulation, or bleeding, breathing and an open airway in a wounded patient.

Tactical combat casualty care, the focus of the second day of training, consists of three phases: care under fire, tactical field care and casualty evacuation.

In the care-under-fire phase, the most important goal is to gain and maintain fire superiority as well as to control life-threatening bleeding.

"This [course] is battle-stressed," said Powell, who is from Sacramento, Calif. "You're not any good to your patient if you can't achieve the mission."

The medics taught techniques for assessing and treating additional wounds during tactical field care. This phase of treatment comes when Soldiers performing a mission have suppressed or eliminated hostile fire and before they can evacuate the casualties.

Some of the most challenging first-responder techniques in the class are in this phase, according to Burdick, who has served as a combat medic for four years. He is on his second deployment to Iraq.

One such technique is a needle thoracostomy, or inserting a needle into the chest cavity to relieve swelling from air trapped due to severe trauma, also known as a tension pneumothorax.

"That's a really advanced life-saving technique," said Burdick. Overall, the EFR course provides "a lot of knowledge very quickly."

One important thing for EFR students to take away from the course is using creativity to assess a patient, said Powell. "You won't always know what [the injury] is, but you need to find out."

The most challenging part of the course for the students might be the nasopharyngeal insertion, said Burdick.

That long phrase means applying lubrication to a rubber tube and sticking it up a patient's nasal passages to open and maintain an airway. Unlike the needle thoracostomy, students actually practiced this technique on each other.

"People need to prepare themselves mentally," said Burdick, who demonstrated by inserting the tube into his own nasal passage on the second day of training.

Pfc. Randell J. Romero, Company A, 101st BTB joint network node signal switch operator, had a few suggestions if the instructors ever wish to explore alternative methods of training the nasopharyngeal portion of the class.

"Just a slide. Perhaps a video," said Romero, who is from Los Angeles, Calif. "I tasted lubricant for lunch."

Burdick and Powell also taught the class how to give fluid therapy, including inserting an intravenous catheter to administer fluids and closing the line with a saline lock, which leaves the catheter in the patient's arm while providing an opening for the next level of medical care to insert another drip.

The course is normally four days long, but instructors taught an abbreviated three-day version due to mission requirements, according to Burdick.

"We're still teaching everything we taught in the rear," said Burdick. The difference between taking the EFR course at the 101st Sustainment Brigade's home station, Fort Campbell, Ky., and on deployment is in the facilities available for teaching.

One example of the changes is in the obstacle course portion of the class. At Fort Campbell the medics have an actual obstacle course where they can test Soldiers' abilities to get patients off the battlefield utilizing different carrying techniques.

At Q-West, the students assembled at the Morale, Welfare and Recreation football field, next to a front line ambulance, or FLA, a modified Humvee with a patient compartment and large, red cross on the side. At the field, Burdick and Powell showed the students how to use two types of litters.

One by one, Soldiers in full battle gear began the course by low-crawling to a "casualty," picking the casualty up and running to a SKEDCO litter, a flexible plastic sledge with straps to secure a patient. The Soldier then strapped his or her patient to the litter and dragged him or her to the waiting FLA.

Students played the part of additional casualties, and the Soldier running the course directed his or her "team" how to load them into the FLA correctly.

Spc. Peggy Smith, 725th Transportation Company, 71st Corps Support Battalion truck driver, had never used the SKEDCO litter. Smith said: "I've seen them, but I just never used them."

Smith, who originally trained as a combat medic but now drives for her North Carolina National Guard unit, said the course made her miss working as a combat medic.

Romero believes the litter training is the part of the course he is most likely to use.

"You have to know what to do from start to end," said Spc. Mitchell Case, HHC 101st Sustainment Brigade mechanic, from Waterloo, S.C. He added, all of the training is important.

"This was an excellent refresher as far as first responder training," said Cory Bouldin, WSI firefighter, from Piedmont, S.C. Bouldin served in the Marine Corps and is now a firefighter in Belmont, S.C.

Some Soldiers, such as Pfc. Brandon Wade, HHC 101st Sustainment Brigade mechanic, from Birmingham, Ala., took the class for the first time. Others, such as the firefighters, came to the class with prior medical and first responder training.

One can take the same class over a year with different instructors and learn something new each time, said Justin "Baloo" Alvarez, WSI firefighter from Woodruff, S.C.

"It's pretty fun having different kinds of people," said Powell.

The medics try to teach the course each month. Due to mission requirements, the next EFR class is scheduled in January.

Soldiers in the 71st CSB and 101st BTB can obtain a slot in the class through their training noncommissioned officers. If any additional slots are available, troops on Q-West can obtain them through the Mayor's Cell on a first-come, first-served basis.