Page 116 - JSOM Winter 2023

Security Service of Ukraine
Yurii Chmyruk, Ihor Tereshchenko, Anton Kolpak,
Mykola Andriievskyi, Medical Service of the
Special Operations Center, Kyiv, Ukraine
he path the wounded in the Special Operations Center “A” of
Tthe Security Service of Ukraine go through – from simple to
complicated
“The man who senses the wind of change should build
not a windbreak but a windmill. ”
—from The Dead Zone, by Stephen King
During the period of full-scale invasion, the Medical Service
of the Special Operations Center “A” of the Security Service of
Ukraine underwent significant changes in work approaches as
well as in principles of work performance. Without a doubt,
change occurred because of unfolding events, dictated daily by
modern war.
During this time, several options for planning the medical sup-
port for the Center’s employees were worked out and modified.
In addition, several basic and flexible models were created – from
the point of injury to the stage of qualified medical care and
rehabilitation.

achievements of the four nominees of the European Best Medic In addition to basic training in tactical medicine, there was one
Award as part of the evening’s networking event on the first more change in the training of employees and combat medics –
day of the conference. The story of the Ukrainian city council they were involved in the process of training surgical teams, as
member who became the head combat medic of her brigade well as working with such teams and helping the wounded at the
and had to treat her own fiancé and brigade commander on stabilization points of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
the battlefield shook heart and soul of everyone gathered.
More than anything else, this case summed up the importance Surgical teams able to perform damage control resuscitation/
damage control surgery (DCR/DCS) while being very close to the
of any effort that aims to promote and further the efficiency area of interest have appeared in the Center. This means that the
of tactical medicine. time from injury to surgical care has been significantly reduced.

General Johannes Backus MD, Commander of the Armed Combat medics as well as resuscitation and surgical teams had
Forces Hospital, Ulm, summed up concisely the key moments the opportunity to not only use the whole blood, hemocytes, and
of the conference. He focused on the importance of putting equipment necessary for this procedure but also to improve the
effort and means into the development and promotion of tac- acquired skills.
tical medical care principles. In his view, they play a leading
role in strategic, operational, and tactical planning processes. The Center’s medical team is in close coordination with medical
As a result, he vowed to continue to support the Armed Forces services of other special units and the medical units of the Armed
Hospital, Ulm, by engaging with and organizing future CMC Forces of Ukraine. The Center had experience in the formation and
conferences for years to come. With this he bade goodbye to operation of a non-standard forward surgical team with elements
of qualified medical care. For the first time, the decision-making
the participants after two highly successful days. procedure for the evacuation of the wounded by air changed.
Save the date: Paris SOF CMC Conference, 15 and 16 October Each task performed by the Center’s medical service as well as
2024 and CMC Conference 2 and 3 July 2025. See more at each novelty and experience is carefully analyzed and imple-
www.cmc-conference.de. mented into day-to-day activities.

Autonomous Battlefield Care –
The New ABC
Colonel Paul Parker, active-duty Consultant Orthopaedic Trauma
British Army
hen en route to pick up a casualty, a drone can be regarded
Was ‘expendable.’ On the return journey, only the casualty is at
human risk, but the alternative is an expensive and almost strate-
gic risk that involves the aircrew and the medical treatment team.
A MERT helicopter is a very large and very high-value target.
The loss of perhaps even two such platforms might be campaign-
altering in the eyes of the public. A specific limitation to unmanned
aerial vehicle (UAV) transport without a treatment team is that it
represents casualty evacuation (CASEVAC; no intervention during
flight) rather than medical evacuation (MEDEVAC; dynamic in-
tervention during flight).

114 | JSOM Volume 23, Edition 4 / Winter 2023