Question for the DOC, or any TARTC members, that may read this forum

rwgast_logicdesign

So I delivered pizza on a marine base for many years. One thing I remember was they used smart cards. I was browsing parallax's store and saw that smart card readers are only 10 bucks, and the cards are less than $2!

This got me to thinking, there are a few places in my project where it may make sense to intergrate a smart card. One instance would be to transfer the data from a urinalysis box to the actual hydration pack or o'Cammel as were calling it. Another may be to store the data about whether the soldier was drinking water when he was alerted too, that way when he ends up in sick bay with dehydration, the nurse can scan his card and see if he was actually drinking when o'Cammel alerted him too!

My question is, are smart cards in standard use, do soldiers carry one or multiple smart cards, what kind of data is on these cards? If lets say this project went somewhere and got a grant for acuall use would it be easy to write to the smart cards soldiers carry or even allowed? If the system used a smart card, but it meant the soldier had to carry an extra just for the o'Cammel it would seem pretty pointless. I guess im just asking if the use of smart cards sounds like a good idea to integrate in to technology the soldiers may already be carrying?

Invent-O-Doc

Interesting question. Smart cards are mostly just read in computers for email access and the like. At one point, there was a prototype for memory storage dog tag. There have been recent discussion of a high capacity data card (Called CAC or Common Access Card) that would include some medical record data, triage and treatment information. Rather than data reader cards. Consider read/write RFID for triage card. They could electronically track the flow of casualties (read only) on a central system or even (read/write) include a record of the triage and treatment progress. If you can't find and need some example lecture material on the process how casualties are received and processed in this environment, PM me with your email and I'll send you some materials. (I've got a power point on how chemical casualties are processed)

rwgast_logicdesign

I was just looking in to the smart cards because they are cheap to get set up, and I thought they were used in the service quite a bit, guess I was wrong.

I think you may have my project confused, I would hope there's not so many casualty's from dehydration you need an RFID system to track them , do you have any material on the military's requirements for staying hydrated?

NWCCTV

Well, I served in the Army for 6 years back in the 80's. It was pretty simple, actually. If you're thirsty, drink!!! Of course, there are always the ones that don't get it. They were usually weeded out in Basic Training but I am sure at war time some of them find a way to slip through!!!!

There have been recent discussion of a high capacity data card (Called CAC or Common Access Card) that would include some medical record data, triage and treatment information. Rather than data reader cards. Consider read/write RFID for triage card. They could electronically track the flow of casualties (read only) on a central system or even (read/write) include a record of the triage and treatment progress. If you can't find and need some example lecture material on the process how casualties are received and processed in this environment, PM me with your email and I'll send you some materials.

This is actually very close to my project idea. Can you send that .pdf to andyn@nwupgradesplus.com? I am hoping to have my video and form sent in this weekend.

Invent-O-Doc

The Army heat categories and recommended hydration are posted here from an official source:

http://www.dmrti.army.mil/adl/WeatherInjuries/HTML/11.html

More detail from the army training folks:

http://www.tradoc.army.mil/surgeon/Pdf/Heat%20Risk%20Manual.pdf

Nice summary of wet bulb temperature calculation (w/ nice short cut to approximating it at bottom of page)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wet-bulb_temperature

rwgast_logicdesign

Thank you very much DOC, really appreciate it. I just have to say it is really awesome you and Ken are around to help us out with little details.

borisg

Thanks for posting the rehydration guidelines. *One of the things that I noticed is that salt intake is not emphasized as much as I think it should. *Didn't realize how much sweat salt excretion varies between individuals until went to a CME event where one of the speakers had worked as an NFL team doctor and, in the SE US, each player required their own individualized electrolyte replacement solution. *Some of the players would lose 30 gm of salt in a workout.

That's got me thinking about a simple way of checking sweat chloride concentrations as it would be nice to prevent hyponatremia from salt loss alone. *I guess for now it's the old method of looking to see if people have salt rings on a black T-shirt which means high salt requirements for exercise in a hot environment. *Would there be any field utility for a simple electrochemical test for sweat chloride content? *Sounds like in some of the very hot deployment areas obtaining a sweat sample would be rather easy.

Are MRE's very salty? *Otherwise I figured that salt tablets would be easier to carry. *When I'm not sweating a lot taking a salt tablet causes nausea whereas when I was planting trees in 90 F heat, chewing a salt tablet was very pleasurable.

Invent-O-Doc

MREs are super loaded with what they consider to be optimal for battle nutrition. They do have nutrition information on the boxes and I think they: 1. Are very high calorie if you eat the whole thing 2. Probably have more salt than one would think based on taste and 3. They plug you up.

mindrobots

Invent-O-Doc wrote: »

MREs are super loaded with what they consider to be optimal for battle nutrition. They do have nutrition information on the boxes and I think they: 1. Are very high calorie if you eat the whole thing 2. Probably have more salt than one would think based on taste and 3. They plug you up.

Was #3 a design feature or an unexpected side effect? :0)

Invent-O-Doc

I've met with the people who design the meals - an interesting bunch. They really try their best to make the meals as enjoyable and useful as possible. The most recent one is a 48 hours 'battle pack' of snacks that are intended to get you through the start of a military encounter on the run - lots of packaged commercial food in that kit. Anyhow, I suspect they DO WANT YOU PLUGGED UP intentionally.