AAMG physicians offer Stop the Bleed course for the community to save more lives in emergencies

(SAN FRANCISCO) A large number of mass shootings occurred across the country and took many innocent lives in recent years The Chinese and Asian communities could not be exempted from being victimized by the active shooters. Dr. Edmund Tsoi, a surgeon in San Francisco Chinatown, was motivated to offer the Stop the Bleed project course for the community to help save more lives.

Dr. Tsoi first had the idea of offering the Stop the Bleed courses after the Monterey Park and Half Moon Bay shootings killed almost 20 people occurring around the Chinese New Year earlier this year.

The Stop the Bleed project was initially started and influenced by the Sandy Hook Elementary School tragedy in 2012 in which 26 victims were killed and the majority of the victims were young children. The project was conceived in a cooperative effort lead by the American College of Surgeons to develop a bleeding control curriculum geared towards the public.

Out of these tragedies, a Bay Area coalition was formed between local physicians and leaders, community-based organizations and the San Francisco Marin Medical Society to teach the public how to control bleeding from accidental and intentional injuries and save lives.

May is national Asian Heritage Month along with the 5th annual Stop the Bleed Month. Under the partnership between the All American Medical Group (AAMG), San Francisco Marin Medical Society, and Self-Help for the Elderly, the first Stop the Bleed class took place on May 20 at the Self Help for the Elderly Jackie Chan Recreation Center in the Richmond District of San Francisco.

"Your safety is your first priority. If you are injured, you cannot help others. Help others only when it is safe to do so," said Dr. Tsoi who served as an instructor in the Stop the Bleed course.

"The number one cause of preventable death after the injury is bleeding," Dr. Tsoi said in the class. Bleeding control is the purpose of the Stop the Bleed training. Dr. Tsoi stated that everyone could save lives if the victims were able to be stopped bleeding immediately to prevent from losing too much blood.

"As simply as a piece of cloth can stop bleeding," said Dr. Tsoi in the training class. People can use the medical gauze bandage to put into the wounds of the victims who are injured in any incident to stop bleeding. If a gauze bandage cannot be found nearby, a piece of cloth or your clothing can serve as the gauze to be put into the wounds.

Tourniquets are professionally manufactured and can be purchased as a tool to more effectively stop the bleeding. Dr. Tsoi advised that anyone who put the tourniquets on others’ upper arms needed to write down the time on it. The maximum time for putting a tourniquet on anyone was up to 6 hours. "The time is very important for the first responders to arrive to know when they assist the victims," said Dr. Tsoi.

The California State Legislature passed a legislation, Assembly Bill 2260, in 2022 to require the installation of trauma bleeding control kits in all newly constructed public and private buildings throughout the state. The legislation, Emergency Response: Trauma Kits, is the first statewide law to make bleeding control kits widely accessible. Dr. Tsoi and AAMG physicians supported the legislation.

The Stop the Bleed skill can also apply to any emergencies at home, traffic collisions, disasters or any life-threatening incidents.

The public can join the Stop the Bleed project training online by visiting the website, www.stopthebleed.org. But the online video is in English only.

Dr. Joseph Woo, President of AAMG, is planning to work with Dr. Tsoi and medical student Janna Yang to produce a Chinese-language Stop the Bleed training video for the community.

The Stop the Bleed project is a grassroots effort. A course is available across the nation. Anyone may contact local hospitals and ask for courses to be held in the local community. Anyone can make a request for offering a Stop the Bleed class by emailing and contacting stopthebleed@facs.org.