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Trauma Surgery in an Austere Environment: Trauma and Emergency Surgery in Unusual Situations

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Surgery During Natural Disasters, Combat, Terrorist Attacks, and Crisis Situations

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Abstract

Many guidelines are available to assist in the provision of essential trauma care in various settings including guidelines that stress the feasibility of effective, coordinated trauma systems using simple planning, organizational, and process improvement concepts (Mock et al., Guidelines for essential trauma care. World Health Organization, 2004; Latifi et al., World J Surg 38:1898–1904, 2014; Wisborg et al., J Trauma 64:1342–1348, 2008). As with other reports of trauma care in particular settings, we hope to augment these general guidelines with our own unique lessons learned from providing trauma surgical care in our unusual situation. Setting up, maintaining, and improving a facility to provide trauma and emergency surgery in remote, potentially hostile locations, is a daunting task. However, the US military, by necessity, has the unique background, personnel, and resources to expeditiously provide care in these austere environments. A deployed surgical team’s success in these settings relies on adequate preparation, pre-deployment training, resource acquisition and assurance, team organization with ongoing training, and dedication to process improvement.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of General Surgery, Naval Medical Center San Diego, BLDG 3, 4th Floor, 34800 Bob Wilson Drive, San Diego, CA, 92134, USA

    Seon Jones M.D., F.A.C.S. & Gordon Wisbach M.D., F.A.C.S.

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  1. Seon Jones M.D., F.A.C.S.
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  2. Gordon Wisbach M.D., F.A.C.S.
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Correspondence to Gordon Wisbach M.D., F.A.C.S. .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Surgery, Advanced Laparoscopy and Metabolic Surgery, Tripler Army Medical Center, Honolulu, Hawaii, USA

    COL Robert B. Lim

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Jones, S., Wisbach, G. (2016). Trauma Surgery in an Austere Environment: Trauma and Emergency Surgery in Unusual Situations. In: Lim, C. (eds) Surgery During Natural Disasters, Combat, Terrorist Attacks, and Crisis Situations. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-23718-3_3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-23718-3_3

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-23717-6

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-23718-3

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