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(GROVE CITY, Pa.) Allegheny Health Network’s (AHN) Grove City Hospital is now offering training in the Stop the Bleed® program to area organizations through its Level IV Trauma Center. Stop the Bleed® was developed by the American College of Surgeons Committee on Trauma (ACS COT) to raise awareness and educate the public on the importance of controlling bleeding in someone who has sustained a life-threatening injury.

The number one cause of preventable death after a critical injury is blood loss, which can be minimized by taking three quick actions. To date, over 1.5 million people worldwide have learned how to perform these actions to stop the bleeding in a severely injured person. “As a trauma center, one of our main priorities is to prevent trauma in the first place, but also to prevent loss of life when trauma does occur,” said Heather Erickson, trauma coordinator for AHN Grove City. “Instructing everyone we possibly can on how to perform Stop the Bleed® is one of the most effective ways to do that.”

Stop the Bleed® emphasizes that anyone can find themselves that person who is closest to a bleeding victim due to an accident or disaster, and the one who’s most likely to save him or her from bleeding to death. By teaching people how to address an actively bleeding wound through proper placement of a makeshift tourniquet, application of direct pressure or packing, bystanders become empowered first responders.

For interested organizations, AHN Grove City will provide a Stop the Bleed® training course as well as a Public Access Bleeding Control Kit of life-saving bleeding control equipment, such as tourniquets, pressure dressings and gauze bandages. There is no charge for the kit or the training course, which will be conducted by a certified Stop the Bleed® instructor, and may be scheduled by contacting Heather Erickson at heather.erickson@ahn.org.