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Principles Of Combat Surgical Care In A Staged Evacuation System, Vivian C. Mcalister, Rob Stiegelmar, Brian Church, Ray Kao

Vivian C. McAlister

Background: The NATO hospital classification of hospitals describes an orderly transfer of patients with severe injuries through a series of increasingly sophisticated hospitals as they are brought from the point of injury to their home hospital. Forward hospital surgery is restricted to damage control and resuscitation while definitive surgery is performed at home by the destination surgical team. In reality many patients enter the hospital chain higher up and some receive definitive surgery as they proceed through the chain of evacuation. The purpose of this paper is to determine if clear doctrine exists to guide the performance of surgery on …