Medical class at the NRAAM

And this is what we do to gun-hating protesters when we catch them!

No, not really. (That'd be like picking on the short-bus kids and it's just wrong.) What we're seeing here is a demonstration on how to quickly and securely splint an arm.

One of the additional bonuses of the NRAAM is the lectures and seminars offered to members on a variety of subjects, and a great one the past two years has been a "shooter self care" class taught by Kelly Grayson of Ambulance Driver fame. Kelly, a long-time paramedic and genuinely nice guy, puts this class together and pours a ton of work into it as a public service to gun folks to teach those who want to learn what they can and should (or should not) do if someone is accidentally shot nearby or just keels over from a heart attack.

This four-hour class, which includes hands-on work with Automatic External Defibrillators (AEDs) and tactical tourniquets for bleeding control, offered invaluable instruction to those attendees who signed up, and the course fee covered the cost of a deluxe emergency first-aid kit that each student was taught how to use by Kelly, with the assistance of other volunteer medical public safety professionals EMS Artifact, JB on the Rocks and LawDog as well as your humble scribe. Additional valuable insights were offered by "students" Maureen and Aaron, a doctor and a lawyer respectively.

All that's missing is an indian chief...but we've got a guy who remembers fighting indians, if that counts.

(Again, I kid...he's really a retired military vet and accomplished author, but it should suggest the caliber of people that we had in Nashville this week-end, both in this class and out on the floor.)

The class taught many important concepts, from the obvious--how to stop bleeding, how to perform CPR--to the not-so-obvious: How to get proper emergency medical response into your local range or gun club. Do you know the actual address? GPS coordinates for a med-flight helicopter? Can you identify the proper space to clear for a medi-vac helicopter? And exactly what should you say when you're phoning in a report of an accidental gunshot wound at a gun club when you're calling 911?

In sum, it was a great class offered to great people by great people, and if you get the chance to attend next year in Louisville, it's four hours well invested.