Casualty Simulation Moulage Gains Growing Recognition
Moulage is fast becoming a more widely recognized and utilized form of makeup theatrics for staging high fidelity visual drama in casualty simulation trauma. Moulage is actually a collective term to describe the techniques in creation and application of simulated injuries for real to-the-eye training in clinical/battlefield medical case scenarios.
Moulage has its roots in the latter part of the Italian Renaissance Period during the 1700’s. It was a method developed by using common wax materials as a medium of sculpture for recreating and preserving disease cases for later study. Over 4,000 wax models were produced during that time, and used extensively to educate and train medical doctors all over the world. Today, some of these early moulage specimens still survive and can be seen at the Museum of Moulage at the University of Zurich, Switzerland.
Moulage techniques came to the forefront of Army soldier training in the very early 1960’s for creating and facilitating casualty simulation experiences. Materials used back then consisted mainly of “kitchen and craft” items, such as cornstarch, flour, petroleum jelly, plastic wrap, and modeling clays along with various kinds of coloring agents. These items were fashioned to simulate life-like depth and dimension of injuries on the face and body. Theatrical greasepaint was also heavily relied upon for final coverage, blending, and detailing the finishing touches. In 1964, the success of these simple techniques led the military to further develop and issue an official moulage kit and field instruction guide through the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology, which became standardized for service wide training for many years.
Today, casualty simulation moulage has evovled to serve many training platforms with it’s own creative energy and unique styling potential that produces hyper-realistic results for any military/civilian emergency response training environment. Our company is proud to provide pre-hospital care personnel with the most advanced moulage technology, techniques, cutting edge materials, and training for their drills and exercises. We use, teach, and have helpe create many of the same technology utilized by special makeup effects experts in the entertainment industry for film and television.
Disaster training exercises that utilizes high fidelity moulage trauma techniques and materials in their scenarios are always going to show consistent improvement in their personnel’s knowledge retention and triage skill set. This includes the critical areas of faster injury recognition responses and implementing proper life saving procedures. What is positively learned in training is retained for real time deployments. That is what moulage is all about!