hey guys my name's sam and welcome to  prepmedic after two years of being on  

the special operations response team in my  area i think i have finally figured out how  

to pack medical supplies for search and rescue  missions and today i'm going to share with you

our special operations team attaches to two  swat teams a search and rescue team and dive  

rescue since i started on the team i have  really struggled in the search and rescue  

balance sustainment items with als capable medical  gear has been a huge challenge and there's not a  

lot of backpacks or kits that are really designed  for that role you have people that like to take a  

ton of supplies and people that are very very  minimalist on our team and i find that i fall  

somewhere in the middle so this has gone through  a couple different evolutions for me i started out  

trying to do both the swat kit and the sar kit  in the same bag that was actually the rats pack  

right here and that was just absolutely monstrous  for both applications because i was trying to keep  

too much in it try to keep everything i needed  for both rolls then i went to a really minimalist  

setup where i took everything i had for medical  supplies and i just kind of threw them in a  

hiking backpack and went and i really found that  i didn't have some equipment that i really wanted  

and it wasn't organized very well for rapid access  that all has brought me here to this pack now the  

pack in front of you i got and i was intending  to do a review on the kit itself this is the  

tasmanian tiger mark ii medica salt pack small and  i was really just going to do a review on this and  

then probably throw it in storage or do something  else when i got it though i realized that this  

had a lot of other potential and i didn't waste  any time and i expected out for exactly what i  

wanted so this is a relatively small medical  bag you can kind of see compared to my hand  

i've reviewed ifax bigger than this i think  the mymetic kit is just a little bit larger  

and this is substantially smaller than my swat  kit the whole thought behind this is that it is  

kitted out to deal with your bleeds and traumatic  injuries like that from falls or other accidents  

in the backwoods but mainly it is designed  to treat orthopedic injuries and some other  

things we might see in the wilderness environment  what i really like about this is this kit here  

can store its handles in the back so i don't  need those out i can take my search and rescue  

pack which is this this is a hill people gear pack  and i can just strap this to the outside of this  

kit which has all of my sustainment supplies it  has my extra layers water food everything that i  

would need as part of the search and rescue team  this will just add to some of its capabilities  

so i can strap that on that backpack or any other  backpack that has cinching straps on the side  

all else fails i can always just  carabiner it to one of the lifting handles  

of a third-party pack if we're trying to split  loads or i'm using something that i'm not used to  

i just take this and put it in there i love  this thing i am super happy with how this  

turned out i'm still kind of playing with it  so not everything's gonna stay the exact same  

starting with the outside as always up here we've  got a pair of x-shears extras are my favorite  

scissors they're pretty lightweight they're very  simple they don't have all the doohickeys that uh  

your raptor trauma shears will have so these have  been a favorite for a long time that just fits in  

this pocket i have just a really tiny beacon on  here it's just a source of light i can put on if  

somebody's you know looking for me or i can mark  a trail head um it was basically just something  

to fill up the velcro there identifier down there  really not a big deal um and then on either side  

we have a tourniquet over here now this kit isn't  really kitted out as a tactical kit i still carry  

all the major bleeding supplies but realistically  in the backwoods if we get to somebody and they  

haven't bled out that's probably not going  to be an issue for us because it takes us  

um you know between an hour to three hours to get  to somebody on average depending on where they are  

so usually the major bleeding unless they've done  uh their own makeshift tourniquet or something  

that's worked it's not gonna be a huge um concern  for us i still have everything that needs to  

go into that march algorithm though now on the  right side of it i have the swishman i always say  

that name wrong traction splint so this is a very  very small traction splint like i said this kit is  

specifically designed for orthopedic injuries  this is for your mid shaft femur fracture somebody  

can lose a lot of blood there we have a lot of  climbers that fall so those bone breaks are pretty  

common for us i really wanted to have something  where we could treat that femur fracture if we had  

to because that's a pretty big deal in the front  pocket and this is packed pretty tightly because  

i've got a lot of stuff on the inside i have two  things so number one i've got the sore rescue med  

mag this has basically it's their pill pack and  this has acetaminophen ibuprofen diphenhydramine  

lopermide bismuth multi-system cold burn cream  triple antibiotic pack hydrocortisone pack  

band-aids and eye drops so it's kind of all of  those little over-the-counter things that you  

might need uh just good to have in these kits  because not everything you're going to is like  

the super serious life-threatening thing and  then in the top if i can get it out we have  

a sam splint so i don't carry sam splint with my  swat stuff and like i said this is pretty tight  

there we go um so the sam splint is just for those  breaks this can be used on legs arms hands it can  

even be turned into a makeshift uh c collar so  there's a ton of different uses for the sam splint  

and that just goes right on the outside pocket  it's kind of where it fit um the best and then the  

pill pack just goes right next to it i'll try to  leave links down uh below to all of these kind of  

off the wall products that i have because a lot of  these are just things i've gotten over the years  

i really like the sore rescue med mag so coming  into the kit itself um this thing is pretty tight  

but i find that it actually works pretty well  it closes easily sometimes you'll be like you  

can't even get it closed again i definitely can so  inside this kit i have this um really not laid out  

in any particular like order in march algorithm  because in the environment we're in i can take  

a little bit more time to get in here and get  exactly what's needed for the patient one of the  

really cool things about this kit is these panels  actually will come out um and these just have that  

these elastic bungees on them so you can kind of  customize them how you want i honestly left this  

laid out exactly as it came in the package because  it worked for what i needed um all right so in the  

lid of the pack here i've got a number of things  so i've got these uh peen hemostats great for  

some minor surgical procedures your finger  thor costumes it can assist with a surgical  

cricothyrotomy can also be used as like tweezers  or getting a thorn out of somebody we do have  

a cactus in the highland desert here below that  we have the gnar survival wrap and that's just  

a hypothermia prevention kit you still need to  insulate the patient but i carry some extra layers  

i can throw on them in my search and rescue pack  that can be used in conjunction with this while  

we're waiting for evac i've got two little plastic  baggies with uh gloves in them and then i've got  

my hyphen chest seals just the twin pack in  there i like them because they're super super  

compact now up in the lid here i've got the gnar  compressed gauze this is um just for wound packing  

it be used as wrap it can be used to wrap the  splint on i've got some other stuff for that  

it can be used to wrap a head wound just really  multi-purpose and really cheap so it doesn't take  

up much room and it doesn't weigh anything so i  like to have that in there next to it i know you  

guys are going to have a cordinary i don't usually  carry elias or laze bandages however you like to  

say it but here i decided that multifunction  was kind of the name of the game so this guy has  

like an eye cup in it it's got a little plastic  sheet can be used as an improvised chest seal  

if you absolutely have to um but mainly it is a  pressure bandage it also has some gauze you can  

use for wound packing as well so i like the fact  that it's multi-function just put it in here it's  

form factor isn't super conducive but it fits in  the pack so i'm not complaining right here i've  

got combat gauze that's for your wound packing  that's a hemostatic agent now in contrast to  

this this is like 45 bucks the difference between  these this will stop bleeding a little bit faster  

but there hasn't been any data to show that  this actually makes difference in long-term  

patient outcome so in this situation you know  compressed gauze is going to work pretty well  

if you can't afford to go with something  like this or if your agency doesn't have  

this combat gauze you can't go with something  else now on this side i've got a thing of sailing  

now this guy here i have shrunk wrap i took  it out of its original packaging in the bag  

and you know you have to kind of follow your  department's policies and procedures for something  

like that because it does technically break that  sterile field on the inside but it still has  

um its cap in there uh so that's still on  that's still sterile and then i just put  

a 20 drop set behind it and vacuum sealed them  together the reason i did that was because um  

there's actually a lot of air in that baggie so  it's nice to be able to get it out and it just  

packs a little bit flatter especially for an  application like this so as we move on to the  

lid contents i got a couple uh things in here uh  in here we've got um the micro bvm the pocket bvm  

you might save a little bit of space taking out  of the container but because this isn't something  

i use a ton and i'm always in these kits i like  to keep it in the container just to keep it from  

getting damaged now this is a bag valve mask which  is pretty cool you open this up and then you can  

breathe for somebody we're only going to do the  bag valve mask respirations for a short period  

of time until we can get an eye gel or surgical  airway realistically um or if somebody's like  

just having uh difficulty breathing we might  assist them for a time wilderness environment  

it gets a little bit difficult to do so that all  packs down in here it's better than mouth-to-mouth  

or mouth-to-mask uh it's just a lot cleaner so  staying on the airway theme over here i've got a  

vacuum pack eye gel um so these are a supraglottic  airway i really don't think it's that realistic  

for our team to carry like a full intubation kit  we can carry that out there but if we're doing  

that i'm gonna need more than just this kit here  um so this is just supraglottic airway it makes  

it easier to bag somebody goes down their throat  and sits and it protects their airway slightly  

and then below that i have a north american rescue  crike kit so this is a bougie introducer with  

the uh crike tube in there that we can  cut somebody's throat and put that in  

if maybe they still have a gag reflex or if it's  massive facial trauma something like that we have  

a back up airway besides just the eye gel here so  that all fits pretty well in here um the eye gel  

if you're carrying one and you can vacuum seal  it do so the packaging keeps it really really  

big and rigid and it just kind of sucks so if  you can pull it out of there vacuum seal it  

you're good to go but once again it's technically  not sterile at this point not that anything is  

sterile in the pre-hospital environment your  agency might just take issue with it however  

uh in here i've got a scalpel in the sign that's  got these cool elastic loops on the side so  

i just have a scalpel in there  for the surgical cricothyrotomy  

also you can do a finger thorough cost me with  that you name it and then i've got a 28 french  

npa this one's going to be hard to get back  in on camera just a 28 french npa in there to  

secure the airway you can do that with anybody i  don't carry opas because gag reflexes i just don't  

use them in my practice all that much um so i  kind of stick with the npas for almost everything  

middle of the kit i am carrying a black  diamond headlight now this is um extra from  

what i carry in my other kits this is just to  make sure that any time i'm deploying with this  

if maybe i just grabbed this kit because it's not  that far of a hike i have something to work in  

the dark you know it gets dark quickly and if you  don't have a headlamp you're more of a liability  

to your search and rescue team than anything else  and that just kind of free floats right there  

on this side i've got uh elastic wrap  and this is more for like securing the  

splint to the arm or wherever putting  it it can also be used as a compression  

bandage and then i have two just triangular  bandages old school guys will call these  

cravats and these are for your slings swaths  you can wear them as a bandanna face mask  

tons of uses for these and in this environment  i think they're really important to have because  

orthopedic injuries somebody falling down with a  backpack on their back bracing with their hands  

is pretty common where you'll have clavicle  injuries wrist injuries uh humorous injuries so  

like i said orthopedic injuries is what this kit's  made to treat mainly along with your major life  

threats on this side in this loop i'm carrying  just some electrolytes you have an exhausted hiker  

i carry water bottles in my other kit and enough  for the patient so if we're not doing iv hydration  

then i can open one of these up put it in their  water bottle and just replenish some of those  

electrolytes if they've been sweating a ton and  then ideally we'll hike them out we don't really  

want to carry somebody out of the trail you  go much more than 500 feet and that becomes a  

huge pain so we try to walk somebody out whenever  possible and then additionally on the side we have  

two ars needles i'm going to change these out  to 10 gauge needles when i get a chance these  

are just the 14s not that there's anything  wrong with 14 gauge needles just 10 gauges  

are going to work a little bit better now lastly  this top little pouch here this is also removable  

if you want to take this out i've got a couple  things oral glucose for your diabetic issues  

a thing of med admin syringes needles  whatever you need to give a medication  

is wrapped right up in here some tape to  secure stuff and then lastly i i bought a  

vacuum sealer and it's it's been a lot of fun  to use uh i've got three iv needles a flush  

um and then some start kits in there with j loops  if we're gonna start ivs i really like it in here  

because the paper packaging over time gets really  damaged this just protects it from the elements  

i cut two little slits on either side you can just  tear this open really easily and use the iv kit  

so that is what i have in here for med admin now  you're thinking well sam you don't have any meds  

why do you need med admin supplies two things  that are not in this kit that i will take out of  

my swap bag because i don't have uh duplicates  of it and it wouldn't fit in this anyways i'm  

going to take my diagnostic pouch which is just  a rip away container that has my pulse oximeter  

blood pressure cuff stethoscope and pen light and  i'm going to put that in my search and rescue bag  

and then my medication pouch i'm going to take  that out and put that in the search and rescue bag  

as well along with some minor items like your mole  skin basically the things that you would need for  

hiking through the wilderness so those are all  going to go in the other kit and i'm going to  

switch them between the two bags as i need to but  this is pretty much packed and ready to go for the  

major things in theory i could just grab this and  go and treat a majority of life threats in the  

field even though i've been doing it for about  two years the search and rescue realm remains  

relatively new to me and especially  packing gear i'm not an expert in it  

so if you guys see anything that you would change  or something i don't have that you would have or  

vice versa leave them in the comments  down below and i will see you next week

you