GREENWOOD (KFSM) — ‘Stop The Bleed’, a statewide initiative to teach bleeding control for emergency situations is making its way to students, faculty and staff at Greenwood schools.
Law enforcement and first responders around the state were the first to receive this type of tourniquet training and now those with the campaign are working to teach schools.
The training focuses on teaching how to use a tourniquet to stop bleeding. Arkansas Children’s Northwest pediatric surgeon, Marcene McVay said severe bleeding can cause death very quickly and in some cases, before first responders are able to arrive to the scene.
“We really try to impress with people with this program that severe bleeding can cause death within a matter of ten minutes,” McVay said. “That may be before EMS is able to arrive, so we want your neighbor, your bystander or yourself to be able to act to control that bleeding and literally save a life.”
McVay said what the school learns is timely following an increase of active shooter situations, but it will all be valuable for much more than shooting emergencies.
“That’s really not the sole purpose of this,” McVay said. “You can control bleeding in any scenario, so in the state of Arkansas, we have schools, playground accidents, industrial accidents, car wrecks. A big thing that we have in Arkansas every spring is tornadoes and you can have significant injury causing significant bleeding with any of those types of situations.”
After 25 percent of the school receives the ‘Stop The Bleed’ training, it will then be awarded funding or a grant for a wall-mounted bleeding control kit.
That kit will be accessible to the public at the school and includes up to eight bleeding control kits with tools that were taught in training.
Those with the campaign hope to eventually teach all Arkansans similar training.
For more information about ‘Stop The Bleed’, click here.
