Since the Civil War, military commanders have faced one unchanging fact when their troops go into combat: Half of those who die will have bled to death on the battlefield.

But military medical officials believe they now can save many more lives.

Medical teams heading to the Persian Gulf with thousands of troops for a possible face-off with Iraq will be taking along new products to stop the loss of blood, and officials with Camp Pendleton's 1st Marine Division are working feverishly to incorporate a new system that would bring trauma care to the front lines.

The system, which the military calls a Forward Resuscitative Surgical System, is a prepackaged portable trauma ward that can handle up to 20 critically-ill patients at once.

http://www.nctimes.net/news/2003/20030113/11111.html