Public Health: more than just shots- Stop the Bleed Campaign
Each training kit comes with a limb, hemostatic gauze, a SOFT-T Wide Tourniquet and a CAT Tourniquet. (Photo by Peyton Meisner)
By Peyton Meisner
This is a series about the Crawford County Health Department and the array of services they provide.
In April 2013, in the wake of the active shooter event at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, CT, what has become the known as the Hartford Consensus was convened to bring together leaders from law enforcement, the federal government and the medical community to improve survivability from manmade or natural mass casualty events.
In October 2015, The White House launched a national awareness campaign called Stop the Bleed®. The campaign serves as a call to action to encourage bystanders to become trained, equipped, and empowered to help in a bleeding emergency before professional help arrives.
Civilians need basic training in Bleeding Control principals so they can provide immediate, frontline aid until first responders are able to take over care of an injured person. Due to many situations, there may be a delay between the time of injury and the time a first responder is on the scene. Without civilian intervention in these circumstances, preventable deaths will occur.
Crawford County Public Health and Crossing Rivers Health have certified instructors available to support Stop the Bleed by providing trainings and by hosting Stop the Bleed classes in the area.
The Stop the Bleed classes teach the public to:
Ensure their own safety
Alert — Call 9-1-1
Bleeding — Find the bleeding injury
Compress — Apply pressure to stop bleeding by:
Covering the wound and applying direct pressure
Using a tourniquet, or
Packing (filling) the wound with gauze or a clean cloth and applying direct pressure
For more information, visit www.crawfordcountywi.org/health.html or calling (608)-412-0229.
