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Story by Spc. Glen Baker
CONTINGENCY OPERATING BASE ADDER, Iraq - Medics with the 224th Sustainment Brigade, 103rd Sustainment Command (Expeditionary), instructed Soldiers using realistic hands-on Combat Lifesaver battle drills Oct. 6-8 at the 224th Sust. Bde. Troop Medical Clinic at Contingency Operating Base Adder, Iraq.
The CLS event gave 16 Soldiers an opportunity to receive realistic training in tasks like dressing an open abdominal wound and applying tourniquets to stop bleeding.
“The training event went extremely well today,” said Master Sgt. Kennedy, medical operations noncommissioned officer-in-charge with the 224th Sust. Bde., and a Lake Forrest, Calif., native. “I know this from reviewing the After Action Reviews, and the Soldiers have overwhelmingly said that this is some of the best training they have received in the Army. They love the hands on portion, and the realistic training with live casualties is great. The students have actually said they want multiple scenarios, multiple casualties…so they enjoy it.”
Kennedy, who served as the course overseer, said that tasks included splinting an open fracture, applying tourniquets to stop bleeding, dressing an open abdominal wound, reporting a nine-line medical evaluation request, loading a patient on a SKED or talon litter for evacuation, applying a chest needle decompression, and applying an emergency trauma dressing.
Kennedy explained the purpose of the training. “The goal is to make the training as challenging as possible and to simulate as close as possible the battlefield conditions,” he said. “Soldiers need to know that treating casualties doesn't always happen in pristine conditions. This was a worst day in Iraq scenario, so we tried to add as much stress as we could while still teaching them how to take care of their casualty, package them for transport, and call in a medevac. This wasn't the test; the test will come when or if they ever have to use these skills to save another Soldier.”
Sgt. Amy Brown, an orderly room NCO with the 224th Sust. Bde., and a Wausau, Wis., native, described what she thought of the training.
“I think the training went very well,” she said. “I think the added twist of having live casualties really made this training different than what most of us have had in the past. With the dummies, you can focus on the wounds; with live casualties, the people going through the course had to interact with us, and in some cases ‘fight’ to treat us because we were squirming around [and] grabbing onto them as they tried to work on us.”
Brown, who served as one of the casualties during the training, explained the roles of the medical staff and the instructors.
“You could tell that the medical staff put a lot of time and effort into the training to make it a very effective experience,” said Brown. “The instructors did a great job of keeping the trainees focused on the task at hand when all the things going on around them started to take their toll on the Soldiers’ mindset.”
Sgt. Raymond Solis, ammunition supply sergeant with the 224th Sust. Bde., and a San Diego native, who also served as a casualty, described what he thought of the training.
“I thought the training was awesome with how dark it was and the strobe lights
flickering through the smoke,” said he said. “It made it seem like a more stressful environment.”
Solis compared this training with training he had in the past. “I noticed they only let so many teams through at a time,” said he said. “With that, they are able to give each team more attention to make sure the training is completed correctly.”
Spc. Marco Alamillo, a medical logistics specialist with the 224th Sust. Bde., and a Redlands, Calif., native, said that his favorite CLS task was the trauma lane. “It gives the students a chance to use what they learned in the class and apply it to a live casualty,” he said.
Alamillo described his role during the course. “My role was to set up the CLS class, from getting all the new up-to-date material from Fort Sam Houston [Texas] and preparing some of the slide presentations,” he said. “I also was tasked with coming up with a trauma lane. I wanted the lane to be better than your average CLS class, which is usually dry and boring. So I took the materials that I had and some that I found to create the lane.”
Alamillo said the training goes above and beyond to certify Soldiers in CLS. “Our training gets your heart pounding and makes you sweat even though you are in an AC [air-conditioned] room.”
| Date Taken: | 10.31.2010 |
| Date Posted: | 10.31.2010 09:20 |
| Story ID: | 59169 |
| Location: | CONTINGENCY OPERATING BASE ADDER, IQ |
| Web Views: | 151 |
| Downloads: | 4 |
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