"Evita Una Muerte, Esta en Tus Manos" Program: Bystander First Aid Training for Terrorist Attacks

The latest terrorist attacks in Europe and in the rest of the world, and the military experience in the most recent conflicts leave us with several lessons learned. The most important is that the fate of the wounded rests in the hands of the one who applies the first dressing, because the victims usually die within the first 10 minutes, before professional care providers or police personnel arrive at the scene. A second lesson is that the primary cause of preventable death in these types of incidents involving explosives and firearms is massive hemorraghe.

There is a need to develop a training oriented to citizens so they can identify and use available resources to avoid preventable deaths that occur in this kind of incidents, especially massive hemorrhage.

A 7-hour training intervention program was developed and conducted between January and May 2017. Data were collected from participants' answers on a multiple-choice test before and after undertaking the training. Improved mean score for at least 75% of a group's members on the posttraining test was considered reflective of adequate knowledge.

A total of 173 participants (n = 74 men [42.8%]; n = 99 women [57.2%]) attended the training. They were classified into three groups: a group of citizens/ first responders with no prior health training, a group of health professionals, and a group of nursing students. Significant differences (ρ < .05) between mean pre- and post-training test scores occurred in each of the three groups.

There was a clear improvement in the knowledge of the students after the training when pre- and post-training test scores were compared within the three groups. The greatest improvement was seen in the citizens/first responders group.