The easy to remember mnemonic MARCH reminds us of the priorities in treating casualties during TECC and TCCC situations. MARCH provides a framework to address immediate life threats and gives an organized approach to begin a casualty evaluation. The MARCH mnemonic is preferable to the ABCDE model because it takes into consideration the reason you need an airway and to be breathing is to circulate blood to the casualty’s brain. Recognizing that, the first step in our casualty evaluation should be to look for massive hemorrhage.
Once past massive hemorrhage, A-R-C is loosely approximated by A-B-C. H- is a reminder that a large number of traumatic casualties arrive at the emergency department or medical treatment facility hypothermic which dramatically increases their death rate.
The MARCH mnemonic can be applied to any patient, as the initial casualty evaluation usually rules out massive hemorrhage.
CAT Environmental Breakage 🕖 Reading Time, 3 minutes We receive frequent questions about shelf-life and environmental degradation of tourniquets. There has been some discussion in the US Department of Defense about declaring a five-year self-life for new, unused commercial tourniquets …
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BLUF*: Hypotensive trauma patients need the cause of their hypotension fixed: whether that is aggressive hemorrhage control, administration of blood products, or needle decompression for tension pneumothorax. IVF is a very temporary fix; blood products would be better. Push dose …
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