Military Medical Care in T2K

[Raellus]

In recent years, survivability rates for wounded soldiers (in first-world armies) have gone way up. I can't remember the figures, but a soldier wounded in 2011 has a much better chance of surviving his wounds than a soldier wounded in Vietnam during the late '60s who, in turn, had a better chance of making it than a soldier wounded during WWII and so on...

I wonder how much this rate would dip in the later years of the Twilight War. By the Battle of Kalisz, I assume that a lot of the more advanced pharmaceuticals (anesthesia, antibiotics) and skilled trauma doctors would have been used up, with no hope of adequate replacement.

How much of the basics of military medical care would still be available in 2000? How much morphine? How many antibiotics? How much blood plasma? Could post-exchange industries continue to produce these modern essentials? If so, at what rate? If not, what are the practical substitutes?

What kind of treatment could a wounded soldier in 2000 hope to receive? There are no more air-evacs, many fewer trained combat surgeons, etc. Do the chances of surviving a bullet wound diminish to WWII levels (at the best)? Is it worse than that? Would a simple bullet wound to a limb in 2000 result in an amputation and a 50% chance of gangrene and death? Am I being too pessimistic?

I'd like to discuss these and related questions here.

[pmulcahy11b]

By 2001, virtually ANY wound has the potential to be fatal, even something like a simple scratch that IRL, you'd probably just clean out with hydrogen peroxide, and put some Neosporin and a large bandaid on and never bother going to the doctor for. By 2001, something like that , which IRL we'd consider minor or even trivial, could easily result in an amputation or even death from sepsis. Many bullet wounds that would receive prompt attention IRL could easily result in maiming or death. Minor illnesses could weaken someone's immune system just enough for something more severe to get in, something that IRL would probably be stopped with some over-the-counter medications and extra fluids and a few days of laying around watching TV quietly and sleeping.

Like before about 1943 or so, the biggest killers on the battlefield are again going to be infection, illnesses, and sometimes, the result of botched medical care by the relatively unskilled or doctors in over their heads without modern medications, equipment, or even proper medical procedures that went wrong due to doctors trying to do relatively primitive analogs of procedures that were state-of-the-art four years before.

[pmulcahy11b]

Originally Posted by Raellus

What kind of treatment could a wounded soldier in 2000 hope to receive? There are no more air-evacs, many fewer trained combat surgeons, etc. Do the chances of surviving a bullet wound diminish to WWII levels (at the best)? Is it worse than that? Would a simple bullet wound to a limb in 2000 result in an amputation and a 50% chance of gangrene and death? Am I being too pessimistic?

If anything, I think that T2K is too optimistic. A lot of care is going to be little better than a Civil War field doctor could administer, and it was well known that treatment at a Civil War field aid station was most likely going to kill you.

[Targan]

Originally Posted by pmulcahy11b

If anything, I think that T2K is too optimistic. A lot of care is going to be little better than a Civil War field doctor could administer, and it was well known that treatment at a Civil War field aid station was most likely going to kill you.

I think that's a little bit pessimistic. Yes, it's true that modern medicines and in many cases medical equipment will be in short supply on the T2K battlefield, but medics and doctors in the T2K world have one important commodity that their Civil War counterparts lacked - knowledge. Even someone like me, a civilian first aider with an interest in the biological sciences, has far, far more accurate knowledge about the workings of the human body than a Civil War era surgeon. Today we understand the importance of strict hygiene, where possible, during medical procedures. We understand the mechanisms of infection, of shock, of blood types and blood pressure, of how the nervous system works. We know that neat alcohol is far better than nothing when it comes to antiseptics.

I think all of that counts for a lot. Survival rates would definitely be significantly higher than on a Civil War battlefield.

[Legbreaker]

I agree, and as I posted elsewhere recently, it wouldn't be hard to believe the best medical treatment available, even in a fully equipped (but short on supplies) prewar hospital, would be no better than that available during WWI. In many areas, where modern medical infrastructure is lacking, a casualty may be lucky to received 1850's treatment.

This isn't to say that where the drugs, medicine, bandages, trained surgeons, etc are all available and in the one place and the one time a casualty wouldn't recieve A grade treatment though - just that take one of more of those elements away and you've got problems.

[Raellus]

Good discussion, so far.

What sort of medicines could be produced post-exchange? Could penicilin molds be grown fairly easily? With all the drug-resistant bugs out there, though, it might not be able to do a whole lot any more.

Pre-exchange medical drugs would be some of the most valuable commodities on the market c. 2000 and beyond (although expiration dates are an issue- although I'm not sure how much that would effect the potency of most medicinal drugs).

Post-exchange drugs would also be quite valuable. I'm wondering what kinds of medicinal drugs could be produced, though.

[ArmySGT.]

Wouldn't medicine be carried on by Colleges and Universities far from major urban centers?

Adams State near Alamosa, Colorado for example.

While Colorado has several significant targets that will draw down weapons, that part of Colorado is farm land without a target upwind until Las Vegas, NM.

[Legbreaker]

As a rule, medicines must still be good a full year after their expiry date (there are mandatory lab tests with the time effectively sped up to do so). It's quite possible that these chemicals, etc could still be quite safe for even longer, however it really depends on what it is and how it's stored.
A vial of morphine kept for six months on the dash of a humvee for example could well kill you, but if that same vial was kept refridgerated and motionless...

[Lundgren]

From a documentary about the battle of Somme, there was a claim that the survival rate was better for those wounded that where stuck in no mans land, than those brought to the hospital. But as already mentioned, there has been quite some advancement in both techniques, and in the knowledge of hygiene.

In a world where there is a lack of of chemical anesthesia, I assume that someone skilled in hypnosis would be worth his weight in gold, no matter how fat he his. The hypnotic coma, or Esdaile state as it is also called at times, would definitely increase the survival odds when going under the knife. But it still would not be much help at a trauma center when someone comes in being critical.