Provider: Dark Angel Medical
Date: August 15/16 2015
Location: Lincoln, Nebraska
Venue: Thunder Alley Indoor Range
Instructors: Ross. Xxxx, Brandon Xxxxx
Venue Details
Thunder Alley is a small indoor range on the outskirts of Lincoln, decent little pro shop, clean bathrooms, break/snack room, and classroom. Overall very nice and suitable.
Personnel Details
15 students, 3 LEO, at least 3 former Mil, 1 Active Mil
Instructors: Ross is a former Navy Corpsman, and then later a medic for a contract security team, currently a paramedic in CA. Brandon is a former Army medic, helped develop the DARK kit, has worked for multiple companies that produce IFAK components and is also a current paramedic in CA
Since this class has been covered many times i won't be going too in depth.
Day 1
Mainly focused on terminology and the understanding of the injuries that we would be learning about as well as how the body reacts to severe trauma. We were introduced to the main components of the IFAK as it relates to different injuries. The simple methodology regarding trauma was Hemorrhage, Airway, Breathing, Circulation, Da Brain, and Exposure. Using this system we were taught to get a patient on the right track for recovering or at least to surviving till more advanced care is available. Biggest take away is bleeding is king unless it's a chest or facial wound, then airway/breathing becomes the priority.
Focus was spent on patient assessments and knowing the signs of a degrading condition. If you don't know what you are looking at its kinda hard to treat.
We were shown multiple examples of situations that could have been handled better or more efficiently if the participants had more training and the importance of demanding scene safety or at least threat elimination before entering a scene too quickly and becoming a casualty yourself.
This really hit home when shown a dash cam video of a trooper responding to a vehicle crash, what is apparent is that there are two vehicles with one patient down in the roadway. Smoke from the one vehicle obscures the scene. As the trooper moves to the patient, it becomes clear that the smoke is actually anhydrous ammonia, a common farming chemical here in the Midwest. The patient is already deceased and the trooper succumbs in less than 10 seconds. Always check the scene and see if you can actually be helpful. None the less the trooper was heroic in his attempt to care for the patient.
The last lecture topic of the day was how shock affects the body, how to prevent it, how to treat it, and how it kills. For an example, a Stage 1 shock victim has experienced 750cc of blood loss, if treatment begins right now the patient has a 94% survivability rating, if the patient loses another 250cc, they enter Stage 2, and even with the best qualified care, patient survivability is 14%. From a femoral bleed that 250cc is a couple seconds at best.
After being shown how to effectively stage the CAT tourniquet we practiced applying it and were sent home with the training models to practice for Day 2's practice sessions.
Day 2
We began early at 8 am, and finished up the lecture series with environmental injuries, patient transport, and casualty triage. A lot of the environmental injuries are preventable and most of this knowledge is basic outdoors common sense. FYI stay away from snakes, because short of anti-venom, nothing can be done. I'm not going to mention much on transport or triage because frankly I'm not qualified to. The biggest factor is recognize who you can save and who is gone.
We chose not to break for lunch and push through the practical sessions. We spilt to 5 teams of 3 and rotated through stations practicing our different skills. Stations included TQ application, wound packing, bandage application, airway insertions, and a scenario based quiz.
Following this we watched a final video of a medical evacuation in Afghanistan by British soldiers, the biggest point of this video was the mindset. They didn't do everything perfectly, but they refused to let their teammate die, and they won. Mindset goes a long way.
After passing out certificates, challenge coins, and turning in our course eval forms, we said our goodbyes and headed home. The class ended early at about 13.15, but I left without any questions.
Takeaways from lecture
The body is a weird thing, at first it tries really hard to stay alive, however once it decides to be done, there isn't a lot that I can do with the equipment I would have to keep that patient alive.
Scene safety is paramount, there are steps I can take to ensure my safety, if that's eliminate a threat, block traffic, put out a fire, or just not involve myself, so be it, creating more patients by getting in over your head is not helpful to anyone. It becomes life over limb, if the patient has to be moved, so be it.
Stop the bleeding, Start the breathing, treat for shock. If I can stop the bleeding soon enough and maintain an airway, that patient will have a pretty decent chance. The faster those steps happen the better the chance.
Practical Application takeaways
Gear placement is important, the way that a TQ is staged could mean the difference in the couple of seconds you get to apply it. It does not come optimally staged out of the package. Also, especially on the CAT, they do degrade in direct sun.
Celox works independently of the body's clotting factors, Quickclot relies on the body. If you have family or teammates on blood thinners or encounter a patient with a lot of blood loss, this can be the factor.
Packing a wound takes a lot of gauze, don't be afraid to use it, the more pressure you apply the better.
You can buy the smaller celox ribbon, and once opened, store it in a ziplock bag. For minor injuries a small 2-3" piece will help clotting, just keep it water proof.
Tourniquets, if I am putting it on my leg the SOFFT is faster due to the buckle, but I have real trouble placing it on my arm. So for me, the CAT wins, however my vehicle bag will have SOFFTs for use on others. The SWATT is cool, but I couldn't mirror the pressure I got with the other two, at least in self application. Furthermore, I couldn't reliably tuck it with dry fingers, much less blood soaked.
Overall class thoughts
Negatives
I would have preferred more examples of real injuries and how they would be treated, but I tend to overthink everything and try to plan for it all.
A class size of 15 is small for DARK, however I felt it was pushing the upper limits, at least with this group of students.
Positives
The instructors know their stuff, and are clearly passionate about saving lives. I enjoyed learning from them and hope that if I ever need the care, that's the kind of guy I get.
I learned a lot, I will need to re read the PPT slides, and the recommended reading list a couple times.
I learned a lot about gear and using it, I feel better knowing what to do. Anything is better than nothing, and training is better than hoping.
The instructors did a great job managing the class, providing breaks, the host provided breakfast on Day 1, I can't ask for much more.
That's all guys, have or question just hit me up.
Date: August 15/16 2015
Location: Lincoln, Nebraska
Venue: Thunder Alley Indoor Range
Instructors: Ross. Xxxx, Brandon Xxxxx
Venue Details
Thunder Alley is a small indoor range on the outskirts of Lincoln, decent little pro shop, clean bathrooms, break/snack room, and classroom. Overall very nice and suitable.
Personnel Details
15 students, 3 LEO, at least 3 former Mil, 1 Active Mil
Instructors: Ross is a former Navy Corpsman, and then later a medic for a contract security team, currently a paramedic in CA. Brandon is a former Army medic, helped develop the DARK kit, has worked for multiple companies that produce IFAK components and is also a current paramedic in CA
Since this class has been covered many times i won't be going too in depth.
Day 1
Mainly focused on terminology and the understanding of the injuries that we would be learning about as well as how the body reacts to severe trauma. We were introduced to the main components of the IFAK as it relates to different injuries. The simple methodology regarding trauma was Hemorrhage, Airway, Breathing, Circulation, Da Brain, and Exposure. Using this system we were taught to get a patient on the right track for recovering or at least to surviving till more advanced care is available. Biggest take away is bleeding is king unless it's a chest or facial wound, then airway/breathing becomes the priority.
Focus was spent on patient assessments and knowing the signs of a degrading condition. If you don't know what you are looking at its kinda hard to treat.
We were shown multiple examples of situations that could have been handled better or more efficiently if the participants had more training and the importance of demanding scene safety or at least threat elimination before entering a scene too quickly and becoming a casualty yourself.
This really hit home when shown a dash cam video of a trooper responding to a vehicle crash, what is apparent is that there are two vehicles with one patient down in the roadway. Smoke from the one vehicle obscures the scene. As the trooper moves to the patient, it becomes clear that the smoke is actually anhydrous ammonia, a common farming chemical here in the Midwest. The patient is already deceased and the trooper succumbs in less than 10 seconds. Always check the scene and see if you can actually be helpful. None the less the trooper was heroic in his attempt to care for the patient.
The last lecture topic of the day was how shock affects the body, how to prevent it, how to treat it, and how it kills. For an example, a Stage 1 shock victim has experienced 750cc of blood loss, if treatment begins right now the patient has a 94% survivability rating, if the patient loses another 250cc, they enter Stage 2, and even with the best qualified care, patient survivability is 14%. From a femoral bleed that 250cc is a couple seconds at best.
After being shown how to effectively stage the CAT tourniquet we practiced applying it and were sent home with the training models to practice for Day 2's practice sessions.
Day 2
We began early at 8 am, and finished up the lecture series with environmental injuries, patient transport, and casualty triage. A lot of the environmental injuries are preventable and most of this knowledge is basic outdoors common sense. FYI stay away from snakes, because short of anti-venom, nothing can be done. I'm not going to mention much on transport or triage because frankly I'm not qualified to. The biggest factor is recognize who you can save and who is gone.
We chose not to break for lunch and push through the practical sessions. We spilt to 5 teams of 3 and rotated through stations practicing our different skills. Stations included TQ application, wound packing, bandage application, airway insertions, and a scenario based quiz.
Following this we watched a final video of a medical evacuation in Afghanistan by British soldiers, the biggest point of this video was the mindset. They didn't do everything perfectly, but they refused to let their teammate die, and they won. Mindset goes a long way.
After passing out certificates, challenge coins, and turning in our course eval forms, we said our goodbyes and headed home. The class ended early at about 13.15, but I left without any questions.
Takeaways from lecture
The body is a weird thing, at first it tries really hard to stay alive, however once it decides to be done, there isn't a lot that I can do with the equipment I would have to keep that patient alive.
Scene safety is paramount, there are steps I can take to ensure my safety, if that's eliminate a threat, block traffic, put out a fire, or just not involve myself, so be it, creating more patients by getting in over your head is not helpful to anyone. It becomes life over limb, if the patient has to be moved, so be it.
Stop the bleeding, Start the breathing, treat for shock. If I can stop the bleeding soon enough and maintain an airway, that patient will have a pretty decent chance. The faster those steps happen the better the chance.
Practical Application takeaways
Gear placement is important, the way that a TQ is staged could mean the difference in the couple of seconds you get to apply it. It does not come optimally staged out of the package. Also, especially on the CAT, they do degrade in direct sun.
Celox works independently of the body's clotting factors, Quickclot relies on the body. If you have family or teammates on blood thinners or encounter a patient with a lot of blood loss, this can be the factor.
Packing a wound takes a lot of gauze, don't be afraid to use it, the more pressure you apply the better.
You can buy the smaller celox ribbon, and once opened, store it in a ziplock bag. For minor injuries a small 2-3" piece will help clotting, just keep it water proof.
Tourniquets, if I am putting it on my leg the SOFFT is faster due to the buckle, but I have real trouble placing it on my arm. So for me, the CAT wins, however my vehicle bag will have SOFFTs for use on others. The SWATT is cool, but I couldn't mirror the pressure I got with the other two, at least in self application. Furthermore, I couldn't reliably tuck it with dry fingers, much less blood soaked.
Overall class thoughts
Negatives
I would have preferred more examples of real injuries and how they would be treated, but I tend to overthink everything and try to plan for it all.
A class size of 15 is small for DARK, however I felt it was pushing the upper limits, at least with this group of students.
Positives
The instructors know their stuff, and are clearly passionate about saving lives. I enjoyed learning from them and hope that if I ever need the care, that's the kind of guy I get.
I learned a lot, I will need to re read the PPT slides, and the recommended reading list a couple times.
I learned a lot about gear and using it, I feel better knowing what to do. Anything is better than nothing, and training is better than hoping.
The instructors did a great job managing the class, providing breaks, the host provided breakfast on Day 1, I can't ask for much more.
That's all guys, have or question just hit me up.