Airmen complete hands-on SABC training

  • Published
  • By Senior Airman David Owsianka
  • 56th Fighter Wing Public Affairs
LUKE AIR FORCE BASE, Ariz. --  Five Airmen from the 56th Fighter Wing Staff Agencies completed the hands-on portion of the Self Aid Buddy Care training Jan. 17 in the education office. The Airmen are preparing to deploy, move to another base or enter their deployment band.

"The class is extremely important because in a wartime environment, self aid buddy care is an Airman's first line of medical opportunity for anyone injured," said Robert Flack, 56th FWSA SABC instructor. "If nobody is around, we have to use the techniques we learned to help ourselves and those around us."

SABC encompasses basic life support and limb-saving techniques to help wounded or injured personnel survive in medical emergencies until medical help is available.

The scope of SABC training covers items such as administrative overview, anatomy and physiology, communicable diseases and universal precautions, airway management, recognition and control of bleeding, shock management, and dressings.

The SABC trainer will review four areas during the course: airway management, emergency bandage, combat gauze and combat application tourniquet.

The objective of airway management is to demonstrate the recommended procedure for insertion of a nasopharyngeal airway.

During the emergency bandage portion of the training, the instructor shows Airmen how to quickly and effectively apply an emergency bandage to an extremity or head of a fellow trainee or themselves.

In the combat gauze training, the instructor teaches Airmen how to apply the combat gauze to a wound on themselves or a fellow trainee by directly observing the trainee.

The combat application tourniquet section went over effectively applying a CAT to an extremity in a "care under fire phase" or in a tactical field care phase.

Training is completed every 24-months at a minimum and is administered to active-duty, Guard and Reserve Airmen. The course requires Airmen to complete the online computer-base-training portion within 60-days before hands-on training can be completed.

"Relearning each of the techniques during the hands-on SABC course was very helpful," said Airman 1st Class Scott Giles, 56th Comptroller Squadron commander customer service technician. "It was a much needed refresher on knowledge that I may need to use as I enter my deployment band."