(TNS) — First there were the simulated gunshots and actors screaming.



Then came shouts of pain and desperation.



"Owww! Oh my God!"



"Help! Help!"



"I think I'm dying."



The chaos, simulating the aftermath of a movie-theater shooting, was created for the benefit of about three dozen Ohio State University medical students.



Held in a training area on the OSU Wexner Medical Center campus, the Tuesday event was designed for fourth-year medical students who are finishing up an optional course in emergency preparedness and disaster response. Also participating were students who plan to specialize in emergency medicine.



Each was asked to play a part in the scenario, from the theater-goer trying to help victims to the emergency medical technician to the emergency department physician.



"It provides the comprehensive A-to-Z experience of what they would expect at a mass-casualty scenario," said Dr. Dan Bachmann, an emergency medicine physician who is a co-director of the emergency preparedness course.



Bachmann said the scenario took months to plan, with a simulation team taking about a week to put it into action. On Tuesday, the faux theater featured movie posters, tickets and popcorn. The beginning of the film Bride Wars was shown just before the gunshots rang out.



Actors with simulated wounds filled seats, and mannequins representing more victims were strewn on the floor.



"I don't want him to die here in this theater," pleaded an actress with her arm around her actor husband. "Three people have looked at him so far. Please do something."



One man with gauze around a bloody abdomen squirmed on the floor, shouting for help.



Another, limping with a tourniquet around a leg damaged from a bullet wound, sobbed, "I want my family. I can't find them. Where are they?"



Bachmann said this is the fourth year for the emergency preparedness course. The first year offered three small simulations. The previous two included a simulation of a subway bombing.



"These events — whether it's a bombing like the Boston Marathon or shootings like Las Vegas, school shootings — they continue to happen in higher frequencies," he said. "So there's a chance that some of the people who are training today might be there on the scene of one of these events.



"If we can provide some tools to help them manage that better, that's what our goal is."



Before participating, the students attended presentations on how to initially react during a shooting, how to use tourniquets to stop bleeding and how to prioritize those in most need of help.



Student Bobby Wassel, who played the part of an emergency medical technician, said the experience forced medical students to work as a team and assign responsibilities amid a chaotic, disorganized setting. He checked on patients at the theater, using cards to label some as dead or expected to die and attending to others in immediate need due to bleeding or breathing complications.



"There's just nothing that can take the place of experience," Wassel said. "Through training exercises like this, that gives you more and more experience so that when the real event comes up, you have some more muscle memory to rely on."



Bachmann said the emergency preparedness course, which draws about 12 to 15 people each year, helps students consider not just shootings or bombings, but also hurricanes, blizzards or even a bad bus crash. A limited amount of emergency preparedness also is part of the general curriculum.



The simulation will be repeated this week for emergency medical physicians who are in training and for nurses.



jviviano@dispatch.com



@JoAnneViviano



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