eli5 : why do ordinary soldiers carry multiple tourniquets but tourniquets are mostly not used in civilian first aid?
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I think the reason is twofold:
The type and frequency of major trauma injuries are much higher on the battlefield than civilian life.
Time and evidence. Prior to the Boston marathon bombings there wasn’t much evidence regarding the complications of using TQs. This is why you have a lot of people here saying incorrectly that the use of a TQ would lead to the loss of limbs and generally be a last resort. The Boston bombings showed the use of TQs both improvised and the relatively new at the time Combat Application Tourniquet (CAT) gave significant better clinical outcomes than expected. This helped support a renewed interest from researchers into their use. Since then, there has been a flurry of papers which show that limbs can have TQs applied for hours without major complications. Due to this, clinical advice to use TQs to control major bleeds has become much more standard (at least in the UK) and are being taught and carried by more people.
I think as time goes on, they will become more standard for civilian use. It just takes time for the clinical advice to filter through to these changes.
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