Medic

Posted on June 3, 2021June 24, 2021 by Brian McLaughlin — Leave a comment

If You Don’t Already Know, Here’s the Theory on Pressure Dressings:

If you have a good understanding on how to use your gear, it frees you up to think outside the box and come up with solutions to problems you might face in an emergency.

Everyone wants to be that person who saves the day, calm, cool, and collected while the world goes to hell around them. It’s an admirable trait and one anyone can cultivate with a little practice.

Part of that journey includes having a good understanding of your gear. If you know how to use what you’ve got, your effectiveness and efficiency (both essential for saving lives) skyrocket.

Here’s a brief run-down of what a pressure dressing is and why you need one (or a dozen) in your trauma kit:

Posted on April 9, 2021 by Brian McLaughlin — Leave a comment

Extending Your Resources: TOP 5 Multi-Use Trauma Gear

An emergency usually means you have little or no resources available to recover from a bad situation. Being able to extend the life of precious resources like trauma gear might become an essential skill set, and it happens to be one that medics pride themselves in.

Unless you're heading out to do errands in a fully stocked ambulance, you aren’t going to be able to carry all the things you might need for trauma control. And the situation only gets worse for multiple casualties.

Some things you just can’t get around, like carrying tourniquets for life threatening bleeds or seals for chest wall punctures. But if possible, carrying items that can be used for more then one type of injury is good for extending the number, and different kinds of emergency trauma you might encounter.

Here’s a list of items that can handle more than one job:

Posted on March 3, 2020April 21, 2020 by Brian McLaughlin — Leave a comment

A War Medic’s Tips for Avoiding Panic

Leap into action with a calm, but aggressive decisiveness.

It’s easy to understand that dealing with trauma is stressful. Emergencies are usually unexpected, and the surprise of a life-threatening injury can throw even a normally calm person into panic.

This is especially the case when you don’t have any training in first aid since you aren’t sure what to do. I know well what that particular feeling is like. I have been the one standing there looking at a life-threatening injury and not knowing what to do about it. It’s a terrible feeling and one I work to avoid whenever I can.

Fortunately, it’s possible to avoid that feeling of helplessness, and since it’s affected me so strongly, I’ve put a lot of thought into how it can be dodged. Here’s one technique for how to manage panic in an emergency.