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America's Army Player Saves Real Life

EL1TE   on 18 January 2008 - 10:55 · 15 comments & 21990 views

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It's the stuff press releases are made of, but the story is great to boot. Paxton Galvanek never had medical training, but he'd gone through medic certification in the America's Army video game. Then one November night as he drove down the highway with his family, he watched as an SUV flipped multiple times in the opposite lane.

As his wife called 911, Galvanek pulled two injured passengers from the truck, assessed their wounds, and properly prioritized/administered treatment (direct pressure and elevation) to one of the accident's more brutal injuries, a mutilated hand. In short, he did things just as he should have in a circumstance that could have ended even worse. And yes, Galvanek thanks his training in a video game for his performance under pressure:

"I have received no prior medical training and can honestly say that because of the training and presentations within America's Army, I was able to help and possibly save the injured men. As I look back on the events of that day, the training that I received in the America's Army video game keeps coming to mind."

I remember vividly in section four of the game's medic training, during the field medic scenarios, I had to evaluate the situation and place priority on the more critically wounded. In the case of this accident, I evaluated the situation and placed priority on the driver of the car who had missing fingers. I then recalled that in section two of the medic training, I learned about controlled bleeding. I noticed that the wounded man had severe bleeding that he could not control. I used a towel as a dressing and asked the man to hold the towel on his wound and to raise his hand above his head to lessen the blood flow which allowed me to evaluate his other injuries which included a cut on his head. Also of note, Galvanek is additionally proficient in the art of scrubbing toilets with toothbrushes. What a game!

News source: kotaku

Post a comment · Send to friend Comments · There are 15 additional comments
(1 reply) #1 MightyJordan on 18 Jan 2008 - 11:22
America's Army makes heroes! They should make the first aid section part of school curriculum.
#1.1 Cidinho on 18 Jan 2008 - 11:30
They sure do!
(1 reply) #2 sorlag on 18 Jan 2008 - 11:36
Cool story
#2.1 toadeater on 19 Jan 2008 - 08:33
Quote - (sorlag said @ #2)
Cool story


A little TOO cool... "It's the stuff press releases are made of" is right. If the accident had been more serious, video game medical training would not have helped. You must know you're not supposed to move injured people around don't you? You don't need an army recruitment propaganda video game to teach you that, even a low-budget 70s late night movie can teach you that, and all it will recruit you to do is wear bell bottoms and grow a mustache.

I wonder if this incident even really happened or not, no word about it in the news.
(1 reply) #3 P1R4T3 on 18 Jan 2008 - 11:39
Jack Thompson: "If you can save people with stuff uve learned from games, then u can go on a killing rampage as well. Lets ban those pixels"
#3.1 Croquant on 18 Jan 2008 - 20:53
/shoots Jack Thompson
(1 reply) #4 nvme on 18 Jan 2008 - 12:13
lol.. awesome.. back to shooting people in the head now
#4.1 Swordnyx on 18 Jan 2008 - 15:45
lol you took mine.
#5 Magallanes on 18 Jan 2008 - 14:38
And the verifiable source is?. (at lest in kotaku i don't find any verifiable source, so most likely is a american army's ads in disguise).
#6 PermaSt0ne on 18 Jan 2008 - 16:17
mmmmmm pressure + elevation the injured location is common knowledge and no where does it say the guy got saved because of it. only "possibly" saved

and as for evaluating the injuries...without medical training and real life experience you fail miserably at it

this just seems like a giant PR story for the video game and will give people bad idea's on how to treat real life injuries.
(2 replies) #7 Jack 0Neill on 18 Jan 2008 - 16:36
Sounds far too fake. I've played the game and you don't get much training at all, and all you do is run up to people and see if their health is red, yellow or green and if they have a "blood drop" symbol.
#7.1 XeonBuilder on 18 Jan 2008 - 18:37
I was thinking the same thing..
#7.2 Jack 0Neill on 19 Jan 2008 - 01:16
Quote - (XeonBuilder said @ #7.1)
I was thinking the same thing..

Maybe that guy has a built in HUD!
#8 Rahul on 19 Jan 2008 - 06:48
Imagine what Playing GTA 4 will do to his CAR Jacking abilities
#9 Justin- on 20 Jan 2008 - 04:21
For those wondering about the validity:

http://www.wral.com/entertainment/blogpost/2326793/

or

http://blog.wired.com/games/2008/01/americas-army-t.html

Just Google the man, is it really that difficult?

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