CSU helping military's Green Berets with training

[Team Sergeant]

And now for some good news......

CSU helping military's Green Berets with training
Staff report | Tue., December 4, 2012 @ 3:34 pm

FORT COLLINS—One of the U.S. military's most elite groups is looking to Colorado State University's nationally ranked Veterinary Teaching Hospital to help train its medics.

The Fort Carson-based 10th Special Forces Group – a unit of the Green Berets – is sending medics to CSU’s veterinary hospital for two weeks of intensive animal care training. They’ve also spent time training at Hartshorn Health Center on campus and with CSU Athletics to learn some fundamental sports medicine techniques they can use in the field.

Highly demanding training required
The Green Beret Medical Sergeants are within the action element of the Special Forces Group known as the Operational Detachment-Alpha Team, “ODA” or “A-Team.” Each team consists of 12 Green Berets who have undergone a highly demanding physical and mental assessment, selection, and training process, said Lt. Col. Steve Osterholzer, public affairs officer for the group.

Individual soldiers receive extensive training and experience in a select specialty of weapons, engineering, medical, communications, or intelligence. Additionally, each team is specialized to handle austere environments that might involve skills such as mountaineering, water operations and specialized parachuting or other mobility.

Medical training has historically occurred in human hospitals, but increasingly, medics face animal issues in the field. CSU is one of many partners involved in training the soldiers.

“When we’re on the continent of Africa, for example, the animals are extremely important to these small villages,” Osterholzer said. “We’ve had veterinary clinics where the medics are very important – that supports our overall relationship with the local villagers. Our guys are often working out of a mud hut somewhere where they are the nurse, the doctor, the technician and they’re not in a controlled environment.”

http://www.fortcollinsijournal.com/article.php?id=7627