NON-Medical, SOF personnel operating in small teams conducting dispersed operations in austere environments require additional medical training.

The Ragged Edge Solutions SOEMT (Special Operations Emergency Medical Technician) course was created to train NON-medical personnel on small teams who required additional organic medical support such as those on MARSOC teams, split-team Special Forces detachments, Civil Affairs Teams, PSYOPS Teams, SFAB, AFSOC, and other small elements who don’t have a medic in their hip pocket.? For over 5 years, members of our team have been directly responsible for training over 500 Soldiers, Marines, Airmen, and Coast Guardsmen past the level of a tier-2 Combat Life Saver (CLS) to better provide internal medical support to their small teams. This type of training has been instrumental in addressing gaps identified in multiple capabilities-based assessments (CBA) and DOTMLPF Change Requests (DCR) addressing the preparation and training of these individuals, teams, and units to conduct prolonged field care and extended patient movement in support of dispersed operations in austere or remote environments. My goal has long been to get this type of training out as widely as possible with such a high demand signal and operational need from the guys on the ground.?

I have been involved with all levels of operational and tactical medical training for over 20 years and this course is one of my personal favorites to be a?part of due to the rapid pace of learning. As an instructor there is an unparalleled satisfaction from watching all the lightbulbs of our students switch on as they grasp the principles caring for both injured and ill teammates, their partner forces and foreign national civilians in our irregular warfare simulations and scenarios.? Our mentored, clinical scenarios help develop the budding clinical thought process, critical thinking, and problem-solving skills while enhancing small team cohesion during a prolonged crisis. The professionalism of our experienced cadre, the realistic moulage, and the immersive training environments stress teams of students into an optimal zone of learning to cement the principles needed when operating far from traditional lines of support. Some of the more advanced critical skills addressed in SOEMT include converting tourniquets to pressure dressings, conducting field blood transfusions, administering sick call meds and emergency trauma medications, and some life-saving surgical procedures usually reserved for medics.? When medics are available the SOEMT graduate acts as a highly trained assistant to offload the cognitive burden of the medic by taking over many of the time-consuming tasks required by a complex, ill or injured casualty. Many real-world incidents speak to the usefulness of this type of advanced training program for non-medics.?

This course minimizes the time students are away from their units by frontloading self-paced, didactic material in a distance learning format so that when they arrive in North Carolina they are ready to perform critical skills, practical exercises, and clinical rotations with local EMS systems before testing for their National Registry EMT(NREMT) credential. Some would argue that an NREMT card by itself is not sufficient for a deployed or combat setting, but it provides the students with a standard base of knowledge, skills, and abilities required for basic clinical medicine assessments for DNBI (Disease Non-Battle Injury) casualties and helps immensely with their understanding of their TCCC treatments later in the course. Once they pass their NREMT test, they are reintroduced back into military medicine with an in-depth TCCC refresher to satisfy the mandated training required by the DoD instruction 1322.24. It never ceases to amaze me when we ask the students when the last time that they did TCCC training and many reply that it has been 3, 5, or even 10 years ago! It is mind-blowing that so few soldiers are so far from meeting the annual requirement in the modern, risk-averse climate.?

Some might also argue that non-medics should not be dabbling in the prolonged care of patients, but the operational reality is that surgical resuscitative teams cannot accompany the vast number of teams deployed around the world at any given time. To address this the course includes the Austere Emergency Care (AEC) certificate provided via a standard prolonged field care curriculum along with Basic Life Saver (BLS) and Prehospital Trauma Life Support (PHTLS) certifications.? Most of these teams conduct their own internal planning, recognize their own shortcomings for their specific deployments, and custom-build training plans based on those mission requirements. Our open enrollment construct allows the Commander to selectively send only minimal personnel as needed without the need for a large, long-term contract to bolster the team’s medical capability to buy down some risk to force in a very time-efficient and cost-effective way. This course is not just for DoD! We also accept enrollment from our partners in other governmental organizations and civilians with a defined need for additional medical skills and knowledge.

The distance learning portion of our next course is set to start on 1 Feb with the in-person training beginning 4 March in Harnett County, NC. Let us know if we can help prepare your teams for the worst day of their life...?