MEDCEUR 11 kicks off live exercise

  • Published
  • By Staff Sgt. Julius Delos Reyes
  • MEDCEUR 11 Public Affairs
CAMP PEPELISHTE, Macedonia --  The 2011 Medical Training Exercise in Central and Eastern Europe culminated in a live exercise June 11-13 after more than a year of planning and preparation.

An annual Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff-sponsored regional and multilateral exercise, MEDCEUR is designed to provide medical training and operational experience in a deployed environment to U.S. and partner nations.

"The primary goal of the [hands on portion of the] exercise is to help the Partnership for Peace countries develop their own emergency management system," said Maj. Steven Keifer, U.S. Air Force School of Aerospace Medicine Initial Contingency Response Team officer.

Participating in MEDCEUR are more than 340 medical professionals from the United States, Macedonia, Slovenia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro and Serbia.

"The live exercise tests the interoperability between the countries," said Tech. Sgt. Jeremy Hooten, U.S. Air Force SAM international medicine NCO in charge and MEDCEUR cadre. "It is designed to look at the patient movement through the appropriate facilities."

The participating countries, including the U.S., are here generally as a response to a variety of simulated emergency scenarios and to provide "support" to the host nation Macedonia, Sergeant Hooten said. The earthquake scenario gives a full gamut of medical and trauma patients as well as public health and bioenvironmental situations.

"As part of the exercise, the medical personnel had to treat and stabilize the patients," Major Keifer said.

Multiple medical treatment facilities were set up to provide various capabilities. Participating as the virtual point of the incident was the Macedonian Red Cross. The Montenegrins were responsible for the casualty collection point while the Serbians provided a treatment facility with limited medical capabilities. The American contingent headed up the Expeditionary Medical Support System to provide surgical capabilities.

"We designed different levels of patients needs as part of the live exercise to see if they are taken to the appropriate level of care," Sergeant Hooten said.

The purpose is to test medical personnel in the field and develop the foundation of multinational medical interoperability, the sergeant said.

Major Keifer said the exercise evaluation team ran two different types of scenarios - a mass casualty event, such as mudslide, building collapse or explosion, and minimal types of injuries, including dog bite, lacerations and burns.

"The exercise was very realistic with a mix of patients," the major said. "During a disaster response to an earthquake, you see a lot of crushing injuries; we tried to mimic those as much as we can. As far as the minor injuries, you would have those naturally."

Lt. Col. Thomas Williford, 31st Medical Support Squadron commander and MEDCEUR EMEDS commander, said the exercise provided the U.S. service members an opportunity to operate in an EMEDS environment and familiarize themselves with the equipment and processes used in a deployed location.

"This is the first time I have participated in an exercise of this magnitude," Colonel Williford said. "It has been extremely collaborative and cooperative. More importantly is the chance to interact with other nations, understand their capabilities and to be able to communicate or correlate our capabilities with them."

The medics were also able to tour each others' facilities, observe and discuss how each country operated and executed their emergency medical procedures.

Col. Nikola Zec, Serbian Deployable Hospital commander, said multinational cooperation was a great experience for him and his team. It wasn't their first time to work with other nations; however, it was a new experience to learn something and compare with others.

"The exercise was well composed," Colonel Zec said. "It is very useful and informative for our medical staff in learning how to treat, control and track patients. It is also a great cooperation with other nations."

Aside from the moulaged patients, variety of medical scenarios and field medical treatment facilities, adding excitement to the exercise was a Macedonian MI-17 from Muschanci, Macedonia, that was used for the simulated medical transport of patients.

"Seeing the handoff of the patient from the helicopter to the medical personnel added that realism," Sergeant Hooten said. "It brought everybody together; the Serbian technicians evacuated the patient from the aircraft, transported him to their facility for stabilization, and moved him to the American EMEDS, to receive care in the emergency and operating rooms. Every piece was put together with that one single patient, which illustrated we are working together."