Bandage Tests Promising

Army medical researchers say tests of new field bandages and a clotting compound could greatly improve survivability on the battlefield by preventing blood loss in wounds that would not be helped by tourniquets. The Army Surgeon General’s office says that more than 270,000 12-foot strips of the combat gauze and 17,000 packages of compound, called WoundStat, are headed to the combat theaters in Afghanistan and Iraq. Combat medics will add the equipment to the improvised first aid kits they now carry.