New York Air Guard medical technician hones skills during trauma treatment course in Hawaii
The Armed Forces Advanced Trauma Training course, AFATT for short, is designed to bridge the gap between theory taught in a classroom and real-world tactical application, according to the course website.
The goal is to prepare students to deal with both battlefield wounds and mass casualties in a disaster, the website says.
Hicks is the only full-time Air Guard Reserve (AGR) medical technician assigned to the 224th Support Squadron.
The instruction is so intense that the students used human cadavers for the hands-on training instead of the high-tech mannequins often used in this training, Hicks said.
“ They’re great training aids, but it is nothing like the actual cadaver we used for this training,” Hicks said. “
“You can actually feel the 'silver skin'—the tough connective tissue—that you're punching through to know you're in the right area. You really can’t get that same training with a mannequin,” he added.
The four-day course was taught in Honolulu by Global Training Institute, a contractor hired by the military.
The first two days of the course were spent in the classroom covering the basics of tactical combat casualty care, Hicks said. This included tourniquet drills, intubations, ventilator operations, chest tube placement, suturing, and patient body drags.
Following the academic phase, the training moved to Marine Corps Base Hawaii. This was where Hicks and the other students worked with actual human bodies.
The realism of the cadaver lab also allowed the students to dive deeper into clinical reasoning rather than just memorizing steps,” Hicks said.
“After the practical drills, we went into the science behind what we do—the reason why patients are crashing when ventilators aren't set right, or why there is a need for chest tubes,” Hicks said.
Hicks said he hopes he will never have to put these advanced skills to the test in a real-world mass casualty scenario.
But, he said, having the hands-on practice ensures that as the 224th's sole full-time medic he is ready for anything.
"It's the best training I hope I never have to use," Hicks added.
The Eastern Air Defense Sector, headquartered in Rome, New York, is part of the North American Aerospace Defense Command and is responsible for the air defense of the homeland. The 224thAir Defense Group, an independent wing-equivalent group of the New York Air National Guard, is located at EADS and provides the forces to conduct the air defense mission.
The 224thADG has several squadrons and detachments. The 224th Air Defense Squadron, the 224th Support Squadron, the 224th Security Forces Squadron and a Canadian Element NORAD detachment serve in Rome. Two geographically separated units, the 223rd Air Defense Squadron and the National Capital Region Coordination Center detachment, serve in the Washington, D.C. area.
For more information about the New York Air National Guard, visit http://www.dmna.ny.gov/. For more information on the Eastern Air Defense Sector and the 224th Air Defense Group, visit http://www.eads.ang.af.mil/.
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