Bart Gullong

Last updated
Bart Gullong
Bart Gullong.jpg
Born1948 (age 77–78)
OccupationEntrepreneur
Known forCo-developing and marketing QuikClot
Children1

Charles Barton Gullong (born 1948) is an American businessman best known for developing and marketing QuikClot, a hemostatic dressing designed to rapidly control bleeding, with its inventor Frank Hursey. Gullong was instrumental in bringing QuikClot to the entire United States Armed Forces and overcoming initial resistance from the US Army Institute of Surgical Research. [1] QuikClot is the hemostatic agent of choice recommended by the Committee on Tactical Combat Casualty Care and it has saved thousands of lives. [2]

Contents

Early life

Gullong grew up in central Connecticut and attended Tabor Academy and Marietta College. He was an accomplished rower and went on to become the head crew coach at Connecticut College. Gullong served as a Title IX advocate, [3] recruited the future Olympian oarswoman Anita DeFrantz on campus, and gained national renown as a coach. [4]

Entrepreneur

In 1999, Gullong met inventor Frank Hursey, who was developing a blood clotting agent based on the mineral zeolite. [5] After the September 11th attacks, Gullong brought the zeolite product, now called QuikClot, to the attention of the U.S. Navy and Marines. QuikClot performed better in blood-clotting tests than all other hemostatic products. [6] The Navy and Marines adopted QuikClot, and it was deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan in 2002.

Controversy with U.S. Army

QuikClot was adopted by all service branches except the Army, which favored two competing products. Both failed, and one, recombinant factor VII, may have exposed soldiers to life-threatening risks. [7] [8] Army medical personnel criticized Gullong, claiming that QuikClot burned surrounding tissue when applied to a wound. [9] [10] The burn risk affected only 3% of treatments in a field study, with the benefits vastly outweighing the costs, and soldiers and families made informal arrangements to obtain QuikClot. [11] Gullong worked with mineral scientist Galen D. Stucky and the Office of Naval Research to develop an improved product employing kaolin, which causes no burns. [12] In 2008, this product, QuikClot Combat Gauze, was adopted by the entire U.S. military as its hemostatic agent of choice, and remains so to this day.

In 2019, Taylor Swift stated, "I carry QuikClot army grade bandage dressing, which is for gunshot or stab wounds", citing her fear of an attack at one of her concerts. [13] In 2020, QuikClot was sold to Teleflex for more than $500 million. [14] Charles Barber's 2023 book In the Blood: How Two Outsiders Solved a Centuries-Old Medical Mystery and Took on the U.S. Army positioned Gullong as the chief protagonist. Gullong was the commencement speaker and received an honorary doctorate degree from Marietta College in 2025. [15]

References

  1. ↑ Cassidy, Robert M. (November 2023). "Book Review: In the Blood". Proceedings. 149 (11). U.S. Naval Institute.
  2. ↑ "Army 'Rapid Equipping Force' taking root, chief says". National Defense Magazine. 2006-10-01. Retrieved 2025-12-23.
  3. ↑ "Girl Coxswains Create Mutiny". Connecticut Post. 1971-03-04. p. 30.
  4. ↑ DeFrantz, Anita L.; Young, Josh (2017). My Olympic Life. Lebanon, NH: University Press of New England.
  5. ↑ Barber, Charles (2023). In the Blood. New York: Grand Central Publishing. p. 31.
  6. ↑ Alam HB, Burris D, DaCorta JA, Rhee P (2005). "Hemorrhage control in the battlefield: role of new hemostatic agents". Military Medicine. 170 (1): 63–69. doi:10.7205/MILMED.170.1.63.
  7. ↑ "Don't Let Me Die". The Baltimore Sun. 2006-11-20. Retrieved 2025-12-23.
  8. ↑ Hodgetts TJ, Kirkman E, Mahoney PF, Russell R, Thomas R, Midwinter M (December 2007). "UK defence medical services guidance for the use of recombinant factor VIIa (rFVIIa) in the deployed military setting". Journal of the Royal Army Medical Corps. 153 (4): 307–309. doi:10.1136/jramc-153-04-18.
  9. ↑ "Army's Costly Battlefield Bandage Raises Questions". Los Angeles Times. 2005-12-04. Retrieved 2025-12-23.
  10. ↑ Barber, Charles (2023). In the Blood. New York: Grand Central Publishing. p. 127.
  11. ↑ Rhee P, Brown C, Martin M, Salim A, Plurad D, Green D, Chambers L, Demetriades D, Velmahos G, Alam H (2008). "QuikClot use in trauma for hemorrhage control: case series of 103 documented uses". Journal of Trauma. 64 (4): 1093–1099. doi:10.1097/TA.0b013e31812f6dbc.
  12. ↑ "UCSB Chemistry Professor Receives Top Military Award for Life-Saving Gauze". The Current - UC Santa Barbara. August 11, 2008. Retrieved 2025-12-21.
  13. ↑ "Taylor Swift 'carries stab bandages' after stalker scares". BBC News. March 6, 2019. Retrieved 2025-12-21.
  14. ↑ "Wallingford's Z-Medica sold for $500M+". Hartford Business Journal. Retrieved 2025-12-21.
  15. ↑ Linda Lockhart (2025-04-27). "Marietta College announces commencement speaker for May 10 ceremony". Marietta College. Retrieved 2025-12-23.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.