By Brendan Michaels

You never know when you will need it. That’s why we carry it. If we could accurately predict crime, mayhem and disaster we could prevent it and thus would have no need to respond to it.  With that said, where is your active-shooter kit? What’s in it?

A lightweight trauma first aid kit, carried in your pockets every day, ensures you have the equipment to help you prevail in an unexpected active shooter scenario. This is especially true when you cannot get to your vehicle to grab your active shooter go-bag. This lightweight active shooter kit contains 15 compact items carried comfortably everyday in your uniform pockets. The equipment is small enough that you don't notice you are carrying it.

Blackhawk Tactical Pants

The carrying platform of the lightweight active shooter kit starts with Blackhawk tactical pants that have two large-capacity cargo pockets with elastic webbing inside of them to secure the items in the active-shooter kit for fast access and comfortable wear during the shift. There are two front pockets on your upper thigh and a hidden side pocket that provides needed storage for extra medical supplies with fast access.

Hemostatic Agent to Stop Arterial Bleeding

The three leading causes of preventable combat death are extremity bleeding at 60 percent, the complete collapse of the lung at 33 percent, and an airway obstruction at 6 percent.

Dr. Maurizio A. Miglietta writes in his article “Trauma and Gunshot wounds: What you need to know to save a life” that the five areas where people can bleed enough to cause shock are the chest, abdomen, pelvis, long bones (e.g. Femur), and bleeding out at the scene.

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Applying a gauze bandage on the wound along with pressure can stop the bleeding in many cases. Direct pressure on the wound constricts the blood vessels manually, helping to stem blood flow. When direct pressure does not stop the bleeding or when it is difficult to apply direct pressure to the source of internal bleeding a hemostatic agent like QuikClot should be used on the wound. QuikClot is a mineral material that absorbs the water in the blood, speeding up the natural blood clotting process by highly concentrating platelet and clotting factor molecules in the blood that remains in the wound. Clotting is the body’s natural blood loss mechanism and it works well. Clotting has a tampening effect on the blood flow through the veins. This is important especially when a tourniquet cannot be used or a pressure dressing cannot apply enough pressure to an internal chest or pelvis wound.

QuikClot 1^st Response 25-gram Advanced Clotting Sponge (ACS) is the law enforcement product that uses the same formula as the military product. The QuikClot bead form produces less heat when reacting with the blood. This solved a problem with the older formula that caused second-degree burns in some individuals.

Two QuikClot 1^st Response 25-gram packets are comfortably stored in the right-hand side hidden zippered pocket of the Blackhawk tactical pants. For instant access, one QuikClot 1^st Response 25-gram packet is stored on the front right pocket and one is stored on the front left pocket.  Look for QuikClot here. Next Page

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