S.A. Trauma Institute Gets $3.8 Million Grant For Research

The National Trauma Institute in San Antonio received a $3.8 million grant Thursday from the Texas Emerging Technology Fund to help fund new medical devices and technology to save lives and to help trauma victims.

Two simple products carried by every American soldier have saved countless lives, said Col. John Holcomb, commander of the U.S. Army's Institute of Surgical Research. A one-handed tourniquet can stop blood loss quickly, and a high-tech bandage promotes rapid blood clotting.

The same technology also can save thousands of civilian lives, and that's why the funding for trauma research is so critical, he said.

"What this grant will do is help make Texas a hub for treating trauma-related injuries," Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst said during an afternoon news conference. He spoke at the Institute for Surgical Research at Fort Sam Houston's Brooke Army Medical Center.

The grant is the second-largest the Texas Emerging Technology Fund has given to an institution in San Antonio. The largest was for $4.1 million to the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio to buy a 7-Tesla magnet for research.

"In Texas, we love our veterans," said David Spencer, a member of the Texas Emerging Technology Fund's advisory committee.

The money will go to creating new battlefield solutions that also benefit the civilian population, Holcomb said.

The National Trauma Institute is a nonprofit organization focused on reducing injury, death and disability by funding trauma research, said Sharon Smith, its executive director. The institute coordinates research projects between military and civilian researchers at San Antonio's three level one trauma centers at BAMC, Lackland AFB's Wilford Hall Medical Center and University Hospital.

The trauma research being done at BAMC not only benefits the military but also the civilian population, which sees 150,000 deaths every year from trauma injuries, Spencer said. The goal is to commercialize medical devices and other technology being developed in the military and to spin it out into the medical industry to benefit everyone, he said.

"The kind of research we do here is not esoteric or something we will deliver in the future," Holcomb said. "This is near-term research."

Already, new medical devices, developed in as little as six months, have been put into the field and saved lives during the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, Holcomb said.

Among those products, an Army medic developed the one-handed Combat Application Tourniquet. The low-tech medical device consists of a black band secured with Velcro and a turning tool to make the tourniquet tighter to stop severe blood loss.

The tourniquets dramatically have reduced deaths related to extreme blood loss, Holcomb said. In fact, the tourniquets have contributed to the highest survival rate on the battlefield of any war, he said.

"Something like this will end up on ambulances," he said.

For thousands of years, soldiers went to war with gauze bandages, and they started out in Iraq with gauze bandages.

The armed forces since have switched to a more high-tech bandage, Holcomb said. Now they use the chitosan hemostatic dressing, a substance derived from shrimp. It's a chemical bandage that quickly promotes clotting to prevent severe blood loss.

Researchers at BAMC along with those at University Hospital also are testing hand-held vital signs monitors that could provide much needed data to medics in the battlefield or at a car crash site.

Trauma research deserves funding, Dewhurst said. The military personnel serving the country and those recuperating from injuries suffered in war are heroes, he said.

"We owe them an obligation to do everything we can to protect them and improve their lives," he said.