GRP 85-A Special Amphibious Reconnaissance Corpsman through combat| Traumatic Brain Injury

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GRP 85- On for this week's podcast is retired Navy Special Amphibious Reconnaissance Corpsman (SARC), and the host of "The Dangerzone" podcast Dan Brown. SARC's are highly trained Special Operations Medical personnel who deploy mainly with the Force Reconnaissance companies and the Marine Raiders. There have been instances where SARC's have deployed with Naval Special Warfare Teams and Army Special Operations Teams. SARC's are trained as amphibious special operations personnel going through various schooling alongside Recon Marines to include: Army Basic Airborne School, Marine Combatant Diver school, Amphibious Reconnaissance Corpsman Course, and the Special Operations Combat Medicine Course.

Dan continued on to complete the second half of the Special Operations Medical Course that typically only the Green Beret Medics complete. SEALs and SARC's will also complete the full course to become Independent Duty Corpsman, but only the senior Corpsman go through the rest of the course. We talked about Dan running Village Stability Operations (VSO) in Afghanistan during his deployment with the Raider Battalion, and how that type of mission is incredibly complex as it requires the war fighter to play the role of a diplomat and warrior. Dan was wounded during an attack in Afghanistan resulting in a Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI). We discussed TBI in some detail which is a topic I plan to cover extensively in future episodes. 

0:00-Intro

11:00-SARC Pipeline

13:30-Special Operations Combat Medicine Course

16:28-SARC employment

17:34-Force Recon Battalion, Marine Raider Battalion

19:16-Independent Duty Corpsman

21:14-Prolonged Field Care

26:49-The positive effects of 15 years of war for trauma medicine in the United States

39:03-Village Stability Operations (VSO)

58:13-Running operations in Afghanistan, wounded in Afghanistan, Traumatic Brain Injury.

1:31:00-Outro

Dan Brown:

The Dangerzone Podcast on Sound Cloud, ITunes, and YouTube.

Instagram: DanielTheBarbarian

Global Recon:

www.globalrecon.net

IgRecon – Instagram

BlackOpsMatter- Instagram

Mission_Critical – Instagram

IgRecon- Twitter

Chantel Taylor:

Instagram: Mission_Critical

Facebook: Battleworn

GRP 62-GSMSG, Iraq, British Army Combat Medic, Navy Corpsman

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GRP 62- Back on for this week's podcast is my good friend retired British Army Combat Medic Chantel Taylor. We discuss the process of becoming a Combat Medic in the British Army, as well as discuss some of her experience's as an Army Medic, and as a Medic working as a contractor in several conflict zones post military.

The second conversation I had is with a former U.S. Navy Corpsman named Cris, who spent the duration of his career attached to the U.S. Marine Corps for multiple combat rotations into Afghanistan. Chris shares a story of a mass casualty event in which he was leading the quick reaction force into a potentially dangerous situation. Cris has since retired from the Navy and is now working with an incredible organization called the Global Surgical Medical Support Group (GSMSG). The GSMSG is an organization that provides medical training and treats soldiers fighting ISIS in Northern Iraq, and elsewhere. They have surgeons, doctors, and military medics working around the clock to train the Kurdish Peshmerga medics, as well as performing surgery on Peshmerga soldiers, and Iraqi Special Operations Forces (ISOF).  GSMSG is now recruiting SOF Medics for a trip into Syria. If you’re interested, apply on their website http://www.gsmsg.org

 Below is an excerpt.

John: Can you share a story of a time you treated a casualty in combat?

Cris: My second deployment to Afghanistan we were supporting the Afghan’s as they took the lead in the fighting over there. We had a lot of mass casualty events. A couple of their vehicles struck an IED and we were the quick reaction force. I was with three other Marines. They could all do the basic interventions to help save lives. Putting on tourniquets, occlusive dressings, needle decompressions. There were 20 casualties total. When we got there the scene was total chaos. We started triaging. Who's alive? who needs care right now? we got everything from a triple amputee to minor burns. Having all my Marines trained to the standard that they could all perform casualty care efficiently was great. Each of us had four casualties. We were able to get them medevac'd and taken to a higher level of care.   

Global Surgical Medical Support Group:

http://www.gsmsg.org

Facebook: Global Surgical Medical Support Group

Instagram:Global_Surgical_Medical_Support_Group

Chantel Taylor:

Facebook: Battleworn

Instagram: Mission_Critical

GRP 61-Matthew McClintock, Special Forces Medics, Transitional Process

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GRP 61- The one-year anniversary of the passing of Staff Sergeant Matthew McClintock. Matthew was an Army Special Forces Engineer Sergeant. With news of his passing circulating through the United States, the online military community really came together to contribute what they could to support his wife and young son. I remember feeling proud to see how Americans rallied around a gold star family.

Co-hosting for this week's episode is Tim Kolczak, the creator of the Veterans Project. Our special guest for this episode is one of Matthew's Special Forces teammates a retired Special Forces Medic named Chris. Chris talked about some of his experiences with Matthew as they had gone through the Special Forces selection course together, and eventually ended up on the same team deploying into a war zone together. Chris took out the time out of his busy schedule to record with us while he's in Afghanistan working as a contractor. We also talked a lot about Trauma medicine, bleeding control, and how the lessons learned from 16 years of hard war on the medical side are now being applied back here in the States raising the level of knowledge to new heights. We also touched on the veteran transitional process and what veterans can do to be successful as a civilian. Below is an excerpt.

John: Can you share a story of when you treated a casualty overseas?

Chris: This happened within the first week that I'd set up a VSO (Village Stability Operations) site in eastern Afghanistan near the Pakistan border. I was still setting up my clinic, and it as told we had a patient at our gate.  They told me he'd been shot in the foot. The guy comes in, and he'd been hit by an RPG. He had shrapnel sticking out of his skull. He had through and through gunshot wounds to both thighs. He had a partial evisceration of his stomach, so his intestines were sticking out. All of these obscure medical techniques that they teach you in the 18 Delta course (Special Forces Medical course) I got to experience on my very first week deployed. We got em out of there completely bundled up. The helo was there in 45 minutes he survived, and he was back with his unit when we left country 9 months later. I wasn't prepared, but the training I'd done over the past two years took over at that point.

Chris:

www.readywarriorllc.com

Social Media: SpecialForcesMedics

Tim Kolczak:

www.thevetsproject.com

Social Media: The Veterans Project

Music provided by Caspian:

www.caspianmusic.net

GRP 57-Slovenian Special Forces Medic, Kosovo, Albania

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GRP 57-  Co-hosting for this podcast is British Army Combat Medic Chantel Taylor. I had a conversation with retired Slovenian Special Forces Medic "Sidik". Slovenia is a small country located in Eastern Europe. We talk about Sidik's time in the Mechanized Infantry in which he has a peacekeeping deployment into Kosovo. During the 1990's the Serbian government was pushing into the Serbian region of Kosovo which is mostly home to ethnic Albanians.

I have good friends of mine who are Albanian, and I remember a time when their fathers left the U.S. to go and help in the effort countering the Serbian advances. The Serbian military pressed into Kosovo and commenced acts of genocide, and ethnic cleansing. The United States and its allies deployed into Kosovo and bombed targets inside Serbia to stop their advances. Sidik upon his return from Kosovo began his journey into the Slovenian Special Forces Regiment. He became a Special Forces Medic and underwent his medical training here in the States alongside American Special Operations Medics. Sidik has a combat rotation into Afghanistan alongside a Green Beret Special Forces ODA. Below is an excerpt from our conversation:

John: A lot of times until something bad happens people believe it could never happen until it's too late. We end up reacting. Having basic knowledge of bleeding control and tourniquet use could make a difference. Let's say someone gets in a car crash and you have a bilateral amputation of your lower leg, with a tourniquet and understanding of how to use it someone's life can be saved.

Can you share with the audience a story of your deployment?

Sidik: We were mentoring the Afghan Police, we ran armed reconnaissance, direct action in going after high-value targets. We went on a big operation into a valley that was Taliban-held territory. The plan was to have one team to set up over watch on top of the mountain with the other team clearing out the valley. I was on over watch. My team consisted of three Slovenians, and two Americans and a bunch of Afghani's. We started out with a couple of hundred guys, but upon reaching the top of the hill it turned out to only be us, and the American's (laughs). We got into a firefight and called in CAS (Close Air Support), but even with the gunships, these guys were still hammering us. When the op was over walking back down the hill suddenly we got 10 guys with us, and then 50 people, and by the time we got back down the hill, we had 300 guys with us again (laughter).

Music provided by Caspian:

www.caspianmusic.net

The Choke Point Podcast, Cro Medical Gear, Army Rangers, SARC’s

GRP 34-On this episode I conducted two interviews. The first is with T a Special Amphibious Reconnaissance Corpsman (SARC) in the Marine Special Operations Command (MARSOC). T spent a number of years in the US Navy attached to MARSOC, and we were able to discuss some aspects of trauma medicine. T is apart of a company called Cro Medical Gear which is owned and operated by SARC’s. They are working on developing a product line of medical gear for the advanced care provider initially, and then will release products for civilians as well.

The Second interview was with 3 former Army Rangers from the 3rd Ranger Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment who run a podcast called The Choke Point. Chance Davis SSG Former Ranger Medic, James Webb SGT Ranger Retired, and Paul Martinez SSG Ranger Retired. These guys are awesome indivus who’ve overcome many obstacles, and who stay busying farming, and working with other veterans. They’ve got books in the works, and are forming an organization to help veterans in need. Below is an excerpt from the podcast.

Paul Martinez: I remember that. We’re having like a Turkey dinner in the middle of Afghanistan in this giant castle compound. It was weird man. I felt like Genghis Khan. You’re looking at these giant Himalayan mountains covered in snow, but its hot where you are. Doc’s got a turkey on the stick. Your extremely well fed. Its one of those things where your sitting in this house, your eating turkey dinner with your best buddies, you’re in arguably one of the worst places on the planet. I couldn’t have been happier. As soon as the sun goes down were back out fighting through ambushes. It was some pretty gnarly fighting.

Send an email to podcast@gloablrecon.net with questions, or comments.

www.cromedicalgear.com

Instagram: SofMedicine

www.TheChokePoint.com

Instagram: thechokepoint

Chanceinaction

Ranger_Webb

Billy_BadAss375

www.globalrecon.net

Facebook: FB Recon

Instagram: IgRecon, Global Recon_INC

Twitter: IgRecon

LinkedIn: Global Recon

Music provided by Caspian: www.caspianmusic.net

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