Page 91 - Journal of Special Operations Medicine - Spring 2016

It is time to expand the ideas of prehospital hemorrhage References
control beyond the surgeons, emergency department 1. Fabbri WP. The continuing threat of intentional mass casualty
providers, and the military and publish such findings events in the U.S. J Spec Oper Med 2015;15(4):124–145.
across disciplines in the journals of general practice. 2. Butler FK. The Hartford Consensus: a major step forward in
The impact on national medical readiness that would translating battlefield trauma care advances to the civilian sec-
come from every civilian primary care provider, includ- tor U.S. J Spec Oper Med 2015;15(4):133–135.
ing the professionals discussed here, having two tourni- 3. Jacobs LM; Joint Committee to Create a National Policy to En-
hance Survivability from Intentional Mass-Casualty and Active
quets and a hemostatic dressing in their work bags and Shooter Events. The Hartford Consensus III: implementation
knowing that AED stations have similar control devices of bleeding control: if you see something do something. Bull
would be profound and would simply save more lives. Am Coll Surg 2015;100(1 Suppl):40–46.

I commend the efforts of this journal and the military
community to push for more exposure in the public sec-
tor. I implore the military academicians who are writing COL MC Fredricks is assistant professor of family medicine
on this topic to escape the traditional reporting channels at Ohio University Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine
and appeal to broader medical audiences in the nonsur- in Athens, Ohio. E-mail: fredrick@ohio.edu.
gical/non-EMS communities. Specifically, this means
journals targeted toward family medicine and general Keywords: hemorrhage control; publication; tourniquets;
nursing. The impact on training and preparedness will civilian
be orders of magnitude greater than the current state
of reporting, and it will reverberate down into medical
professional training programs and shape and institu-
tionalize formal curricula.

Finally, to help Dr Mabry answer part of his question,
I offer that a handful of people will take Prehosptial
Trauma Life Support (PHTLS), Tactical Combat Casu-
alty Care (TCCC), and Advanced Trauma Life Support
(ATLS) courses. Every provider takes BLS, and thus it
is likely the American Heart Association that owns this
aspect of American homeland battlefield care.

Disclosure

The author has nothing to disclose.

Disclaimers

The expressed opinions are the private views of the au-
thor and do not reflect official policy of either the Depart-
ment of Defense, The United States Army, or the Ohio
University Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine.

Letters to the Editor 75