suited to law enforcement operations in austere environments.
Throughout the summer and into the fall of 2014, a Tactical Medicine cadre was formed within the SPPD SET and a Tactical Medicine Program was created. The program’ s curriculum is based upon the concepts and principles of TCCC and TECC and the cadre would serve as a resource to provide tactical medicine training to the remainder of the officers in the department and in our region. The cadre partnered with a community resident and emergency room physician at our local trauma center who would assume the position of Program Medical Director, responsible for training, oversight and quality control of the program.
Tactical medicine, a specialty in and of itself, is essentially the blending of tactics with medicine. Good medicine can equal bad tactics and bad tactics can get people killed. As a result, tactics always take priority over the medical care. In November of 2014, our tactical medicine cadre, together with our medical director, received comprehensive training at the International School of Tactical Medicine
( ISTM).
By the spring of 2015, the SPPD SET Tactical Medicine Cadre had trained all SPPD officers in the developed 2-day, 18-hour training class. As the officers completed the training, the department equipped them with an Individual First Aid Kit( IFAK). The IFAK contains all of the components necessary to effectively treat the leading causes of preventable death in austere environments. Focused on controlling bleeding, the IFAK’ s are equipped with a Combat Application Tourniquet( CAT ®), QuikClot ® Hemostatic Combat Gauze, Vented Chest Seals, a Nasopharyngeal Airway( NPA) and a couple of other ancillary items. In addition to the IFAK, all SPPD officers are issued another tourniquet with a duty-belt worn holder so it can be with them when they need it the most.
On April 1, 2015, revisions to Title 22, Division 9, Chapter 1.5 of the California Code of Regulations( CCR) became effective. The revised regulations now mandated that all police officers in the State of California receive 21 hours of initial training in tactical medicine First Aid / CPR /
AED and 8 hours of refresher training every two years thereafter. The SPPD Tactical Medicine Training cadre has continued with its mission and commitment to be the tactical medicine training resource in our region. Since the program’ s inception, the cadre has provided training to over 115 police officers from 10 regional law enforcement agencies. For the remainder of 2016, the cadre is scheduled to provide training to another 225 regional officers funded completely from the SPPD budget. After a recent award of $ 100,000 in Urban Areas Security Initiative( UASI) grant funding, the program will be able to extend the training to a significant amount of regional officers in 2017. By adopting a regional approach, agencies are able to significantly reduce training costs and become compliant with the new CCR Title 22 requirements.
Our officers and deputies insert themselves into some of the most dire of situations imaginable with a high likelihood of getting injured in the process. It is therefore on us to provide them and the members of the communities in which we serve with the best medical support possible. ■
SPRING 2016 | California Police Chief 39