Injured patients present a wide range of complex problems. The Advanced Trauma Life Support® (ATLS®) Student Course presents a concise approach to assessing and managing multiply injured patients. The course presents doctors with knowledge and techniques that are comprehensive and easily adapted to fit their needs. The skills described in the manual represent one safe way to perform each technique, and the American College of Surgeons (ACS) recognizes that there are other acceptable approaches. However, the knowledge and skills taught in the course are easily adapted to all venues for the care of patients.

The ACS and its Committee on Trauma (COT) have developed the ATLS program for doctors. This program provides systemic and concise training for the early care of trauma patients. The ATLS program provides participants with a safe, reliable method for immediate management of the injured patient and the basic knowledge necessary to:

Course Content:

• Assess the patient’s condition rapidly and accurately
• Resuscitate and stabilize the patient according to priority
• Determine if the patient’s needs exceed a facility’s capacity
• Arrange appropriately for the patient’s inter-hospital transfer (who, what, when, and how)
• Assure that optimum care is provided and that the level of care does not deteriorate at any point during the evaluation, resuscitation, or transfer process

The Advanced Trauma Care for Nurses (ATCN) Course is taught concurrently with approved Advanced Trauma Life Support® (ATLS®) Courses. Benefits of the ATCN Course include an educational, team building, collaborative, synchronized approach to trauma care as trauma nurses share didactic lectures with the physician attendee of the ATLS® Course. Physicians and nurses caring for trauma patients have the opportunity to share a common language and approach to trauma care. When the ATLS attendees break out for physician skill stations the ATCN nurses join small group trauma nursing skills stations.

These ATCN® skill stations are based on an interactive “hands-on”, scenario-based approach to adult education. The practical testing stations allow the ATCN students to demonstrate the application of ATLS and ATCN information on a moulaged patient. ATCN students are given both the ATLS Student Manual and the ATCN Student Manual.

The ATCN course was developed in response to a need for advanced trauma education for nurses. The ATCN course has been operational for over twenty years and is under the auspices of the Society of Trauma Nurses (STN). STN is a professional, international nursing organization that spans the continuum of trauma care. The STN-ATCN® Program verifies successful completion of the ATCN® Course and provides continuing education credit for completion of a course.

ATCN is currently available in over 20 states across the USA, and is also internationally including Denmark, Saudi Arabia, Italy, Hong Kong, Sweden, Puerto Rico, Spain; all offer both student and faculty courses.

For doctors who infrequently treat trauma, the ATLS course provides an easy-to-remember method for evaluating and treating the victim of a traumatic event. For doctors who treat traumatic disease on a frequent basis, the ATLS course provides a scaffold for evaluation, treatment, education, and quality assurance. In short, ATLS is a measurable, reproducible, and comprehensive system of trauma care.