Georgia Resident Uses STOP THE BLEED® Training to Save Neighbor
From the moment he picked up the phone, Leonard Goodelman could hear the panic in his neighbor’s voice.
“My husband just fell from a ladder,” he recalls his neighbor’s wife telling him. “Come quick! Come quick!”
Goodelman, a resident of Roswell, Georgia just north of Atlanta, and a member of the Medical Association of Georgia/Medical Reserve Corps., immediately ran to his neighbor’s house to see how he could help. He found his neighbor lying on the floor in the garage and complaining of chest pains.
After surveying his neighbor from head to toe and ruling out a heart attack, Goodelman noticed a pool of blood below his neighbor’s right arm.
“I lifted his arm and there was an artery shooting blood straight up in the air. Then the a-ha moment came. He’s bleeding! I can STOP THE BLEED®,” Goodelman recalled.
For five years, Goodelman has used his American College of Surgeons’ STOP THE BLEED® training to help when emergencies arise. He also teaches bleeding control techniques to local residents.
Goodelman grabbed a nearby kitchen towel and applied direct pressure until first responders arrived to transport his neighbor to the hospital.
Thanks to Goodelman’s quick thinking, his neighbor was treated and released from the hospital within a few hours and is expected to make a full recovery.
“If you can do something to STOP THE BLEED®, it’s better than doing nothing because you’re making a difference in that person’s life,” Goodelman said. “I believe that anyone who has had training can apply the same skills I used. With training, people can feel empowered to act in situations that cause severe bleeding and can say to themselves, ‘Hey! I know what to do. I can STOP THE BLEED®.”
Leonard Goodelman (far right) participating in STOP THE BLEED® education at the State Farm Arena in Atlanta, Georgia.