Medics train for confidence

FORT CARSON, Colo. - A Stryker comes to a sudden stop outside a small green tent dropping its back ramp, Soldiers spill out looking for help for a fellow battle buddy with multiple life threatening injuries.

Medics of Headquarters and Headquarters Company, 1st Battalion, 38th Infantry Regiment, 1st Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry Division, are training at a forward aid station they set up on Fort Carson, to bring in patients, stabilize them, and prepare the patient for medical evacuation, Jan. 22.

"He [the patient] had a amputation above his left ankle, left chest trauma to the front and the back of his chest and some bleeding from his left ear," said Spc. Maria Venegas, medic, Headquarters and Headquarters Company,1st Bn, 38th Inf. Reg., 1st SBCT, 4th Inf. Div.

This is the first opportunity the medics have had to train with the forward aid station, primarily they trained with their mobile aid station said Sgt. 1st Class David Pring, platoon sergeant, Headquarters and Headquarters Company,1st Bn, 38th Inf. Reg., 1st SBCT, 4th Inf. Div. "This is a great opportunity for the medics to learn how to work with less, the forward aid station has less than half the bodies then the mobile aid stations."

The medical platoon is tasked with supporting Headquarters and Headquarters Company reconnaissance team during their live fire exercise. The medics must stay vigilant in case of a real emergency.

"We are supporting the scouts out here, everybody gets to see what we can do and get confidence in our guys," said Pring.

They were out in the field from Tuesday to Friday with the temperatures dropping to five degrees and more than a foot of snow falling during that time.

"We go to the field like this about once a month," said Venegas "I have gotten way better since I started, it's mainly confidence to take charge.