eli5 : why do ordinary soldiers carry multiple tourniquets but tourniquets are mostly not used in civilian first aid?

Question

eli5 : why do ordinary soldiers carry multiple tourniquets but tourniquets are mostly not used in civilian first aid?

In: 12

Answer 1

Because in civilian first aid, you are generally not very far from definitive care. If you suffer an extremity bleed during combat, you don’t have time to go through the process of wound care and evacuation that you could in your neighborhood. You put a tourniquet on the limb and are reasonably certain that the casualty won’t bleed out from that wound and can go back to engaging the enemy. It takes less than a minute to get a combat application tourniquet (CAT) on an arm or leg.

Once things have calmed and you can readdress your casualty, you can be more deliberate in your care and can then decide whether or not to keep the tourniquet on or if the wound can be managed with a dressing.

It’s both about speed and the fact that you could be away from a hospital for several hours.

Edit: Also, statistically, the vast majority of preventable deaths on the battlefield are from exsanguination from the extremities.