Military and Medic Questions

Silva · Feb 16, 2016

Having some research-resistant snarls for a couple characters. Any thoughts?

A. Kid joins the military straight out of high school in the mid nineties (like 1993-96-- I can be flexible). He's from Boston, if that matters. He needs to see active duty in the middle east, and have training as a medic. What branch of the military does that logically land him in? I've tried looking up who was being sent over during that time, but it was, uh, more confusing than enlightening. I didn't really know what I was looking at. (I now feel stupid.)

B. Some twenty odd years later he runs across someone who (1) caught a bullet across the outside of the arm, (2) had it stitched up by someone who didn't know what they were doing and shouldn't have done stitches, and (3) it's now infected (swollen, pus, fever). Sound realistic? What sort of time frame am I looking at for it to reach that level of infection, assuming the injured person is the hygienic sort (but has also been hitch-hiking around in cold, dry weather since getting stitched)? Can I stretch it out as long as two weeks?

C. What's he going to do? Get rid of the stitches (if so, how is that done) and flush the wound and re-bandage properly? Or something else/in addition to that? (There is no doctor around, but he has a hefty stash of medical supplies.)

D. Cop gets stuck in a hostage situation and the bad guy smashes his hands. Enough to end his career because he can't operate his weapon well, but not so badly that he can't shoot a gun at all. What is a realistic way to make that happen? Is getting smashed on the knuckles with a hammer overkill? What sort of medical attention is he going to get at the time and what will it look like for him ten years later? Is this something that will get worse as he ages, require steroid shots, etc.?

WeaselFire · Feb 16, 2016

Silva said:
A. Kid joins the military straight out of high school in the mid nineties (like 1993-96-- I can be flexible). He's from Boston, if that matters. He needs to see active duty in the middle east, and have training as a medic. What branch of the military does that logically land him in? I've tried looking up who was being sent over during that time, but it was, uh, more confusing than enlightening. I didn't really know what I was looking at. (I now feel stupid.)

First issue, we weren't at war in the Middle East from 1991 to 2001. He might have seen duty in the Balkans, Bosnia or Serbia, as a peace keeping member, but not terribly likely.

Now, all branches have medical personnel of all types. Army is the most likely to see service in, but not until Afghanistan and Iraq.

Silva said:
B. Some twenty odd years later he runs across someone who (1) caught a bullet across the outside of the arm, (2) had it stitched up by someone who didn't know what they were doing and shouldn't have done stitches, and (3) it's now infected (swollen, pus, fever). Sound realistic? What sort of time frame am I looking at for it to reach that level of infection, assuming the injured person is the hygienic sort (but has also been hitch-hiking around in cold, dry weather since getting stitched)? Can I stretch it out as long as two weeks?

Two weeks is likely fine. That wound wouldn't even normally need stitches, bandages are fine.

Silva said:
C. What's he going to do? Get rid of the stitches (if so, how is that done) and flush the wound and re-bandage properly? Or something else/in addition to that? (There is no doctor around, but he has a hefty stash of medical supplies.)

Stitches will have fallen out or been absorbed. Even if they're still there, scissors and a pair of forceps/tweezers. Any monkey can do it. Draining the wound, cleaning and bandage, then antibiotics. If the guy has a fever, you will need the antibiotics.

Silva said:
D. Cop gets stuck in a hostage situation and the bad guy smashes his hands. Enough to end his career because he can't operate his weapon well, but not so badly that he can't shoot a gun at all. What is a realistic way to make that happen? Is getting smashed on the knuckles with a hammer overkill? What sort of medical attention is he going to get at the time and what will it look like for him ten years later? Is this something that will get worse as he ages, require steroid shots, etc.?

Way too variable to give you specifics, but you can write it however you want. If he has one hand crippled, he'll no longer be an officer but can easily shoot a gun.

Jeff

redfalcon · Feb 16, 2016

He would need to be in the military by 1989 to hit the 1st Gulf War 90-91. The 82nd was the first boots on the ground for that. The tank units saw more action thN most grunts, the MPs also saw a lot. I would say the Army had the biggest force there. For the mid nineties in the Middle East, I think we had a peace keeping force in the Sinia.

Sorry for the repeat, missed the first reply while typing.

Silva · Feb 16, 2016

redfalcon said:
He would need to be in the military by 1989 to hit the 1st Gulf War 90-91. The 82nd was the first boots on the ground for that. The tank units saw more action thN most grunts, the MPs also saw a lot. I would say the Army had the biggest force there. For the mid nineties in the Middle East, I think we had a peace keeping force in the Sinia.

Sorry for the repeat, missed the first reply while typing.

WeaselFire said:
First issue, we weren't at war in the Middle East from 1991 to 2001. He might have seen duty in the Balkans, Bosnia or Serbia, as a peace keeping member, but not terribly likely.

Now, all branches have medical personnel of all types. Army is the most likely to see service in, but not until Afghanistan and Iraq.

Okay, I guess I assumed there were still some people hanging around in that general area after '91.

So I would have to make him older to be able to enlist earlier, or settle with him seeing action later in his career, then? The former starts pushing him too old (out of the peer range of other characters which absolutely can't get older), but I think I could swing the latter-- I just need him to be out of the military by 2004 or 2005 at the latest so that other things can happen.

WeaselFire said:
Two weeks is likely fine. That wound wouldn't even normally need stitches, bandages are fine.

Stitches will have fallen out or been absorbed. Even if they're still there, scissors and a pair of forceps/tweezers. Any monkey can do it. Draining the wound, cleaning and bandage, then antibiotics. If the guy has a fever, you will need the antibiotics.

Yes, it's a wound that shouldn't have needed stitching and was stitched anyway by someone who didn't know what she was doing (but likes to think she does, hence overcompensating care instead of under-compensating). I should have also mentioned that sewing thread was used instead of something more appropriate.

WeaselFire said:
Way too variable to give you specifics, but you can write it however you want. If he has one hand crippled, he'll no longer be an officer but can easily shoot a gun.

Jeff

Thanks, you're awesome. I was so fixated on "how can I smash his fingers??" that I never stopped to think that not all of them need to be smashed. :tongue

GeorgeK · Feb 17, 2016

WeaselFire said:
Stitches will have fallen out or been absorbed.

Jeff

That depends on what type of stitches were used and where they were placed. Sutures like silk if they degrade at all will likely take 30+ years. If they were to fall out that means that whatever they were around has become necrotic and sloughed.

Silva said:
B. Some twenty odd years later he runs across someone who (1) caught a bullet across the outside of the arm, (2) had it stitched up by someone who didn't know what they were doing and shouldn't have done stitches, and (3) it's now infected (swollen, pus, fever). Sound realistic? What sort of time frame am I looking at for it to reach that level of infection, assuming the injured person is the hygienic sort (but has also been hitch-hiking around in cold, dry weather since getting stitched)? Can I stretch it out as long as two weeks?

C. What's he going to do? Get rid of the stitches (if so, how is that done) and flush the wound and re-bandage properly? Or something else/in addition to that? (There is no doctor around, but he has a hefty stash of medical supplies.)

The length of time that it takes an infection to manifest can give you a clue as to the source and type of infection. A dirty wound or dirty surgical instruments used on a clean wound will usually manifest by 24 hours. Typically that will be swelling, redness and heat. There also will likely be pain but not necessarily enough for an uninformed patient to not confuse it with the original injury.

Gunshot wounds themselves are typically clean. The burning gunpowder essentially sterilizes the typical bullet. However foreign non-sterile debris can be transferred into the wound by the projectile. Bits of cloth are reasonably common. The strangest that I've seen was someone driving away from a shooter. The bullet penetrated the back window, struck the headrest and the bullet ricocheted away. However the force of the bullet knocked an upholstery screw out of the headrest and had enough force to penetrate the patient's neck and was about an inch and a half deep into soft tissues. A relatively clean, but not sterile foreign body such as that may take days to a week or more depending upon the patient's immune system to manifest and pus out. The weather doesn't matter as long as the patient keeps the wound clean.

Silva said:
D. Cop gets stuck in a hostage situation and the bad guy smashes his hands. Enough to end his career because he can't operate his weapon well, but not so badly that he can't shoot a gun at all. What is a realistic way to make that happen? Is getting smashed on the knuckles with a hammer overkill? What sort of medical attention is he going to get at the time and what will it look like for him ten years later? Is this something that will get worse as he ages, require steroid shots, etc.?

Joint damage may result in arthritis that gets worse with time. Peripheral nerve damage could force retirement if he wasn't willing to take a desk job but may in time heal although 7-10 years to do so would be reasonable

WeaselFire · Feb 17, 2016

Silva said:
I should have also mentioned that sewing thread was used instead of something more appropriate.

Sewing thread works fine, but usually isn't sterile and can also wick both into and out of the wound. That can cause some of the issues you're asking about. Sewing thread doesn't normally degrade like sutures are no designed to, and would likely be debris that needed to be removed when the wound is cleaned and drained. You could handle this with your medic making a comment like "This wound didn't need stitching and common thread wasn't a good choice."

As for service, if you use that time frame, make him Army trained but leave the military and join a reserve or guard unit. Send him in to help in local disasters and get some field experience there. If he has to treat combat wounds, give him an after-military stint as an emergency room tech in Chicago.

For Gulf War service, the troops left in the area that saw combat potential were aircraft enforcing no-fly zones, zilch on medical needs. Bosnia was little in the way of US troop involvement, even as NATO forces, again we were mostly air. But small humanitarian teams were sent to help the local population and he could fit into that as a medic.

We also sent troops to Haiti in the mid 1990s and he could have seen service with medical needs for the local population there. There were a million tiny operations in Africa and around Asia or the Balkans in your time frame, but these were only in the low hundreds of troops on the really major events and, again, most of it was use of air power.

It kind of depends on your story needs. If the military active duty isn't that important to the story line, have someone ask where he learned his medical skills. His reply can be "Army. Six months of patching up locals in Haiti."

Good luck,

Jeff

Silva · Feb 17, 2016

GeorgeK said:
The length of time that it takes an infection to manifest can give you a clue as to the source and type of infection. A dirty wound or dirty surgical instruments used on a clean wound will usually manifest by 24 hours. Typically that will be swelling, redness and heat. There also will likely be pain but not necessarily enough for an uninformed patient to not confuse it with the original injury.

Gunshot wounds themselves are typically clean. The burning gunpowder essentially sterilizes the typical bullet. However foreign non-sterile debris can be transferred into the wound by the projectile. Bits of cloth are reasonably common. The strangest that I've seen was someone driving away from a shooter. The bullet penetrated the back window, struck the headrest and the bullet ricocheted away. However the force of the bullet knocked an upholstery screw out of the headrest and had enough force to penetrate the patient's neck and was about an inch and a half deep into soft tissues. A relatively clean, but not sterile foreign body such as that may take days to a week or more depending upon the patient's immune system to manifest and pus out. The weather doesn't matter as long as the patient keeps the wound clean.

..... holy bleep.

GeorgeK said:
Joint damage may result in arthritis that gets worse with time. Peripheral nerve damage could force retirement if he wasn't willing to take a desk job but may in time heal although 7-10 years to do so would be reasonable

I did suspect arthritis might be a factor. Ten years after being injured, I have him organizing and maintaining a private security team/system under the employ of an old friend; mostly in an administrative capacity. I've already described him as still feeling some stiffness and aching in the affected joints, and a bit of difficulty with things like buttons.

Glyax · Feb 17, 2016

When it comes to seeing combat, if he joined the Navy and went on to be a Navy Corpsman, he would be out with the Marines and have a high chance of going out/seeing combat. We all love our doc's haha

Silva · Feb 17, 2016

WeaselFire said:
As for service, if you use that time frame, make him Army trained but leave the military and join a reserve or guard unit. Send him in to help in local disasters and get some field experience there. If he has to treat combat wounds, give him an after-military stint as an emergency room tech in Chicago.

For Gulf War service, the troops left in the area that saw combat potential were aircraft enforcing no-fly zones, zilch on medical needs. Bosnia was little in the way of US troop involvement, even as NATO forces, again we were mostly air. But small humanitarian teams were sent to help the local population and he could fit into that as a medic.

We also sent troops to Haiti in the mid 1990s and he could have seen service with medical needs for the local population there. There were a million tiny operations in Africa and around Asia or the Balkans in your time frame, but these were only in the low hundreds of troops on the really major events and, again, most of it was use of air power.

It kind of depends on your story needs. If the military active duty isn't that important to the story line, have someone ask where he learned his medical skills. His reply can be "Army. Six months of patching up locals in Haiti."

Good luck,

Jeff

Well, my needs are two-pronged because earlier in the story one character (who is a bit sherlockian and also biased against government and military forces) makes very educated guesses about his background, including where he was while in the military (generally speaking), what he did (saw friends die), and how it affected him, as part of an attempt to undermine his loyalty towards certain individuals the sherlock character doesn't like.

Then later in the story I realized that I needed him to have medical skills so now I'm trying to also not make it "oh look what really handy skill I happen to have, so very conveniently, that nobody knew about before."

Your responses have been very helpful in addressing those issues; thanks.

jclarkdawe · Feb 17, 2016

If they are still in Boston when his hand(s) are crushed, if it was intentional, it would not have been done with a hammer. Either a drawer or a door was slammed on the hand (usually a choice in which hand was offered). Damage ranged from permanent finger position upon healing, to limited range of motion. Joints were frequently permanently enlarged. This was a common punishment in Boston.

Best of luck,

Jim Clark-Dawe

WeaselFire · Feb 18, 2016

Silva said:
... where he was while in the military (generally speaking), what he did (saw friends die), and how it affected him, as part of an attempt to undermine his loyalty towards certain individuals the sherlock character doesn't like.

Give him a longer career then. Enlist in the early 1990s, out in the early 2000's. He then has a reason to be in the sandbox, at least Afghanistan. Or, have him recalled from a reserve unit after 9/11. I have a friend whose son was Air Force pararescue. Left service after the first Gulf War but before 9/11, stayed active in a reserve unit. He drove a UPS truck and received a call from his UPS supervisor to meet him at a local mall. His supervisor was there with a replacement driver, told my friend's son that he'd been called to active duty, drove him straight to the air base and dropped him off, told him his gear would be ready. He jogged down the tarmac and as he ran up the ramp into the plane, still in his UPS uniform, his CO looked at him and said "When you absolutely, positively have to be there overnight." That was his start to six years in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Jeff

WriterintheWind · Feb 25, 2016

Is it plausible or common for someone to join one branch of service, serve and then go into another branch? (army to navy, for example?)

Glyax · Feb 25, 2016

WriterintheWind said:
Is it plausible or common for someone to join one branch of service, serve and then go into another branch? (army to navy, for example?)

People do it all the time, do their initial contract in one, and change. Depending on the branchs involved, different things have to happen

cornflake · Feb 25, 2016

Could someone have left the military around 2004? I think that was unlikely in the Army?

Trebor1415 · Feb 27, 2016

cornflake said:
Could someone have left the military around 2004? I think that was unlikely in the Army?

While there were service members whose enlistments were extended, there were still others who were discharged as normal when their service was up. It depended on the circumstances. If you need a character to get "stop lossed" and stay in for extra time, that is plausible, and if you need a character to serve his term of enlistment and get out, that's plausible too. There was never a "no one is getting discharged in 2004 (or whenever)" blanket policy.

WriterintheWind · Feb 28, 2016

Glyax said:
People do it all the time, do their initial contract in one, and change. Depending on the branchs involved, different things have to happen

Thank you, Glyax

WriterintheWind · Feb 28, 2016

Need a few quotes from veterans for an article/blog post (attributed with their first name only, and branch of service) on topic of Stolen Valor.

Q: As a veteran, what is your opinion about people adopting a fake military career to lure innocent victims for money, sex or for seeking attention?

Thank you for any help. [email protected]

Trebor1415 · Feb 29, 2016

WriterintheWind said:
Need a few quotes from veterans for an article/blog post (attributed with their first name only, and branch of service) on topic of Stolen Valor.

Q: As a veteran, what is your opinion about people adopting a fake military career to lure innocent victims for money, sex or for seeking attention?

Thank you for any help. [email protected]

You probably should start a new thread for this. People will see the topic and you'll get better replies

cmhbob · Feb 29, 2016

Silva, you've already gotten some good answers on things, but I'll point out that all branches of service have medics of some sort. The Marines depend on the Navy for the most part, but every branch has medics, and if there are troops deployed somewhere, there are at least a couple of medics there. And we maintained Operation Southern Watch after 1991, so there was still plenty of call for medical care during that time.

As for your cop, I knew an officer who was arresting a female teen and got kicked in the index of his gun hand - his trigger finger. She had steel-toed boots on, and kicked him on the tip of the finger, impact toward the arm, and split the distal and intermediate phalanges - the first two bones - lengthwise, and badly injured the first two knuckles. It was at first thought to be a career-ending injury, since it was his gun hand. But he was back on duty about six months later, after several surgeries and lots of therapy.

Honestly, I think the best thing you could do, while very gruesome, would be some sort of amputation of most of the index finger. There's a scene in Sniper where the bad guy cuts off most of Tom Berenger's index/trigger finger, and he ends up being able to use his middle finger for the climactic shot.

Military and Medic Questions

Silva

saucy

WeaselFire

Benefactor Member

redfalcon

Silva

saucy

GeorgeK

ever seeking

WeaselFire

Benefactor Member

Silva

saucy

Glyax

Self-proclaimed Wordsmith

Silva

saucy

jclarkdawe

Feeling lucky, Query?

WeaselFire

Benefactor Member

WriterintheWind

Glyax

Self-proclaimed Wordsmith

cornflake

practical experience, FTW

Trebor1415

practical experience, FTW

WriterintheWind

WriterintheWind

Trebor1415

practical experience, FTW

cmhbob

Did...did I do that?