Police in Northwest Indiana have saved more than 100 people since a training program began five years ago designed to teach them how to use a tourniquet to save themselves or their fellow officers if they've been shot.
Monday marked the first time in those five years that a tourniquet was used to save an officer's life, said Lori Postma, emergency preparedness educator for Franciscan Health in Hammond, Munster and Dyer.
Gary officer Donald Briggs used Sgt. William Fazekas' belt as a tourniquet to slow Fazekas' bleeding after Fazekas was shot twice in the shoulder during a traffic stop about 1 p.m. Monday in the 600 block of Johnson Street.
Postma said she didn't think Briggs was among the more than 2,000 police officers in Northwest Indiana trained as part of the Indiana District 1 Hospital Emergency Planning Committee's Save a Cop program.
But Briggs' life-saving actions were an example of just how vital such training can be, she said.
"We teach them this training is to save themselves or their partners," Postma said. "But knowing what to do, they have saved so many people."
Law enforcement agencies in Lake, Porter, LaPorte, Newton and Jasper counties have recorded more than 100 lives saved because of the training, but some of the larger departments have told the District 1 hospital group they've stopped counting, she said.
The training also has helped save lives in other emergencies, such as crashes and traumatic injuries.
"They feel empowered to help others in a different capacity than they normally do as a police officer," Postma said.
The training is fast-paced and puts officers through different scenarios.
"We train them at entry level. It's not like they need to have any medical knowledge," she said. "Sometimes, they're learning to put these tourniquets on blindfolded or in the dark with strobe lights going. We try to put them in realistic situations to make it muscle memory."