ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - The number of deadly victims among the Kurdish Peshmerga troops fighting on their long frontline against the Islamic State group ISIS has decreased, since the troops are being trained to care for their wounded on the battle field.
The training is being conducted by members of the global anti-ISIS coalition and international volunteers, some of whom also work as medics in the field.
In two years of war with ISIS, around 1,700 Peshmerga have lost their lives, 1,200 of whom were killed in the first year.
The high casualty figures is partly because the wounded were not treated at the frontline and bled to death on the way to hospital, said a Dutch marine.
“It was: get him into a pickup and to an aid post as soon as possible,” he said at a base in the Kurdish capital of Erbil. “If I asked the men during the training how long it takes for someone to bleed out, they said, half an hour. They must have got this from the movies. When we told them it only takes two minutes before you are dead, it gave them a new perspective.”
In the past ten weeks, he has offered medical training to hundreds of Peshmerga, as did his three predecessors. For security reasons, he can be identified by his first name only, Jeroen.
When training, Jeroen focuses mainly on teaching the Peshmerga to stop bleeding from arterial veins, “for the main chance is that you are shot and end up with such a bleeding. Our principle is to ‘treat first what kills first’.”
So he teaches soldiers how to put on a tourniquet to stop the bleeding, while also explaining the anatomy behind it. He shows them which materials can be used if there is no formal tourniquet available, as is frequently the case at the frontline.
And he gets them to practice a lot, even during an imitation of a crisis situation. Often he plays the victim himself, “with blood that is spraying out. I had a pupil who stood still in panic, then picked up some bandage to just cover the wound.”
The results are mainly positive. “We had feedback from coalition partners that something has happened with tourniquets, that wounded Peshmerga were being treated on location. Ninety percent of these men survive, and that’s my motivation.”
Transport is another important issue. Most wounded Peshmerga are taken out of the battlefield in the back of a pickup, and it is important to make sure their airways are not obstructed. A wounded man should be put on his side during transport, Jeroen taught the Peshmerga.
The expectation that the battle for Mosul will commence soon has made it a priority to give medical training to every soldier who receives military training, he said.
“At the Mosul battle many can be wounded or killed, and everybody knows this. IEDs (improvised explosive devises) are hot now, so are suicide bombings, and we try to cover that during our training.”
The Peshmerga are very thankful for the help, said spokesperson General Halgurd Hikmat. “I told the coalition only today that this training has a very good result.”
Despite the improvements in training, Peshmerga still bleed out and die before reaching medical care, as was evident recently when a lack of bandages meant a Peshmerga died from a bullet wound to the chest.
“We ask for more help, like mobile clinics near the frontlines, medicines and doctors. The help is great, but it is not enough,” said the general.
Next to the coalition, volunteers are also active. Brits, Americans, and Australians who treat wounded Peshmerga at the frontline also train them in basic medical knowledge. In this way, about a thousand Kurdish soldiers were trained, mainly in large groups near to the frontline.
Still, the medical training has not reached all of the 180,000 active Peshmerga. Dutch trainer Jeroen hopes that a possibility will be created to train Kurdish trainers, so they can carry on his task after he and other coalition trainers are gone.
Doctor Nezar Taib, head of the Department of Health in the Kurdish town of Duhok calls the aid offered helpful but not enough. “The aid is very basic, and afterwards the wounded still come to our hospitals.”
The Kurdish health system is already burdened by over 1.5 million refugees and IDPs residing in the region.
“We receive the wounded from the battlefield, and they compete with the normal casualties. And on top of that it is tradition that hundreds come to visit a wounded Peshmerga. That is a big burden.”
To better care for the wounded Peshmerga, plans have been announced to build a military hospital, though it is not clear how the financial crisis in the region will affect the execution of the plans.
“They have military hospitals everywhere in the world,” said Doctor Taib. “And it would really help us, to have one especially for the Peshmerga.”
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