Medical advances in todays war? ?

Question

If the year were 1965 how many more US troops do you think would of have been killed in action in the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts?

Would we have thousands more KIA, or hundreds more?

And what one medical advancement has aided todays military men the most?

Answer 1

Not one thing but many, the biggest has been the Tactical Combat Casualty Care program adopted and acted upon by NavSpecWar in 1996 and then built upon and spread out to all branches. The new PHTLS has the info on it as well, it basically set up a totally different protocol for the Medics/Corpsman who are on scene first. They used to go by the old Civilian ATLS model but many of those protocols actually can cost lives on the battlefield-examples are No use of tourniquets, overuse of IV's, TCCC has prophylaxis use of Anti-Biotics and many other things that ATLS would never do.

Some individual things that have saved lives when used properly-

QuickClot Powder (Not the ACS Powder)]

Celox

Hemcons

Emergency Bandage (Israeli)

and many other first responder items that are coming on board soon as well, they are already working on a pill to help counteract the effects of a Closed Head Injury/TBI. Some of the stuff coming is just amazing, but TCCC is the biggest initiative so far.

Answer 2

Body Armor.  I realize it is not necessarily a conventional "medical" advancement.  But less guys getting hit in the major organs means more lives saved.  There are still plenty of serious injuries, but the body armor has cut down on damage to major body systems.

Your average Vietnam soldier had what... his helmet?

Answer 3

I'm going to say "quick clot" and Navy Corpsman/Army medics giving CLS classes to their platoons.  CLS isn't really an advancement, but I'm sure it's helped a lot.

Answer 4

Triage, a quicker response, better doctor and a quicker transportation system.  

Answer 5

the cat turniqet