SBIR/STTR Award attributes
The training of combat medics in Tactical Combat Casualty Care (TCCC) has focused principally on the treatment of male casualties. A recent change of policy, lifting the ban on women serving in combat arms makes it likely that the number of women serving in combat roles will increase in the foreseeable future. The risk of female wounding and death will rise as well. For unknown reasons, female casualties have had a higher mortality probability than males in recent conflicts. This finding points to an urgent operational need and a moral obligation to develop improved methods to train combat medics in in the care of female casualties. One required improvement is the development of more realistic simulators to provide medics with enhanced training and experience in the management of female combat casualties. Existing female casualty simulators are unrealistic, doll-like manikins. Operative Experience Incorporated (OEI) has had extensive, DoD-funded, prior experience in developing highly-realistic trauma training systems for combat surgeons and medics. The company proposes to develop a female TCCC simulator with unprecedented anatomical fidelity and modularity to support improved medic training in the care of female casualties.
