Want to learn how to save lives from the comfort of your home? Here’s how
Alexandria Wallen has many years of medical school ahead of her before she can achieve her goal of becoming a surgeon and saving lives. But it was a 1-hour, free course she took while in high school that gave her the skills which might have saved a woman’s life last summer.
Now a freshman at the University of California, Merced, Wallen was driving on a country road between Turlock and Merced when the car in front of her veered into a concrete barrier and rolled several times before landing on its wheels.
Wallen got the first aid kit from her trunk and rushed to help the people inside.
She said the woman in the passenger seat was bleeding heavily from her right leg. She saw a piece of bloody glass on the floor and assumed the woman had pulled it out of her leg.
Wallen got a tourniquet from her kit and applied it to the woman’s leg several inches above the wound. Wallen then moved to the driver and applied pressure to his head wound.
A person can bleed to death, particularly from a wound to major arteries in arms or legs, in as few as three minutes.
Wallen said it took about nine or 10 minutes for paramedics to get to the scene that day.
Registered Nurse Rena Lepard, who teaches Stop the Bleed classes, said Wallen’s actions, “definitely decreased the chances of a really poor outcome. She decreased the blood loss which could have possibly saved (the woman’s) life or prevented her from having a blood transfusion.”
Lepard teaches the Stop the Bleed classes at Doctors Medical Center like the one Wallen took in high school.
The classes were temporarily on hold but are now being offered online beginning Wednesday.
Just as the life-saving skills of CPR and abdominal thrusts have become popular outside of the medical field, Lepard says skills to stanch bleeding are just as important and even more likely to be used.
“Cutting yourself while cooking in the kitchen or working in a wood shop, or falling and getting a major cut; for people on blood thinners a bump can cause major blood loss,” Lepard said.
Bleeding from many of these types of injuries can be stopped with pressure or packing techniques but a wound to the the femoral or brachial artery would require a tourniquet like the one Wallen used.
In addition to the general public, Lepard trains area law enforcement, a growing number of whom are carrying tourniquets on their duty belts or in pockets.
Stanislaus County Sheriff’s deputies applied tourniquets 10 times in an 18 month period ending in March, according to Lt. Josh Clayton, who also is a Stop the Bleed instructor.
From October to February, officers with the Modesto Police Department applied tourniquets on a man who was bleeding profusely from a tube in his arm used for dialysis; the leg of a suspected burglar who was shot by the homeowner, and to a motorcyclist who suffered a severe wound to his leg in a crash on McHenry Avenue.
Other recent scenarios include Ceres Police using a tourniquet on a man who accidentally shot himself in the leg and sheriff’s deputies using one on the arm of a woman who cut her wrists in a suicide attempt.
Law enforcement is often the first on scene, even before paramedics, but no one is there quicker than a bystander, Clayton said.
Stop the Bleed is an initiative of the American College of Surgeons and the Hartford Consensus that arose from the December 2012 shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, that killed 20 first-graders and six adults.
More than 1 million people have been trained; officials with the program have a goal of reaching 200 million “to make our nation more resilient by better preparing the public to save lives if people nearby are severely bleeding.”
Clayton said he wants the skills to become as well-known as stop, drop and roll techniques for fires and wants to see a tourniquet with every fire extinguisher in buildings.
Having the tools and knowledge to stop bleeding can save your life or the life of someone you love. It might even be a stranger, like in Wallen’s case.
As a result of the coronavirus pandemic the Stop the Bleed classes through Doctors Medical Center are currently being held online. They take about 45 minutes but Lepard said a 10 minutes skills component (using the techniques on mannequins) will be held at a later date when it is safe to do so.
Wednesday’s class will be held from 3 p.m. to 4 p.m. It is predicted to be 107 degrees then so it’s a great time to stay indoors and learn a new, life-saving skill.
To sign up for the free class visit the Doctors Medical Center Facebook page or click here.
For more information call Lepard at 209-342-3459.
If you are going to buy a tourniquet, look for a C-A-T tourniquet. It has a rod that tightens the band, can be secured so you don’t have to hold it in place it until help arrives and its the only brand Lepard endorses.
