UPDF Personnel Complete Battlefield Medical Evacuation Course

Uganda Peoples’ Defence Forces officers and militants from Battle Groups 48 and 49, alongside personnel from Headquarter Uganda Rapid Deployment Capability (URDC), have completed a Battlefield Medical Evacuation Course at the URDC headquarters.

The programme covered essential skills for managing casualties in combat zones.

Presiding over the closing, the Commander HQ URDC, Brigadier General Emmanuel Kazahura, said the training supports the Centre’s mission of developing a fully operational force prepared and equipped for national and continental peace support missions and crisis response operations.

“The battlefield medical evacuation course was designed to equip you with the knowledge and skills to balance optimal patient care with the strategic and tactical realities of a combat zone. The immediate clinical objective is to minimise preventable deaths at the point of injury,” Brig Gen Kazahura said.

The Deputy Chief of Staff Operations, Colonel Joseph Okalebo, urged the participants to apply their newly acquired skills and share their knowledge with other troops during operations.

“As you leave HQ URDC today, remember that this is not the end of learning but the beginning of greater responsibility. The challenges you will encounter will require sound judgement, adaptability, professionalism and unwavering loyalty to your service and your nation. I have every confidence that you are prepared to meet those challenges with distinction,” Col Okalebo said.

The head of facilitators, Lt Margaret Nansubuga, said the curriculum covered the roles of a team medic, scene management, triage, catastrophic haemorrhage control, airway management, adult basic life support, heat-related illnesses and cold-weather injuries.

Present were senior and junior UPDF officers.