The nerve tourniquet can be painless to stop bleeding without pressing the wound

According to the American Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers' website "Spectrum" magazine on the 20th, after 15 years of research, American scientists have successfully developed a nerve tourniquet handheld device that can stimulate nerve cells to emit chemical signals to platelets. Stop bleeding when the body is injured. The new hemostatic tool will play an important role in field medicine, emergency response, surgery and post-natal care.

Traditional tourniquets usually use bandages to tighten the limbs of the wound, compressing the blood vessels to achieve hemostasis. This preferred method of hemostasis in emergency situations is accompanied by severe pain. The nerve tourniquet does not require bandages to physically squeeze the blood vessels. The doctor gently presses the hand-held device on the skin to stimulate the vagus nerve that transmits information between the brain and the main organs. The vagus nerve transmits signals to the spleen, and the nerve cells in the spleen release to the platelets. A chemical substance that prepares platelets at any time to exert blood coagulation to stop bleeding when the body is injured.

Chris Kozola, vice president of the Institute of Medical Research, who led the research, said that its mechanism of action is based entirely on the natural physiological pathways that the body controls blood flow. But many experts believe that it is impossible to achieve this principle. “Every time I talk to surgeons about the progress of research on nerve tourniquets, they all think that I am ridiculous and think that this is a fantasy.” Kozola never gave up, and finally succeeded after 15 years.

In 2010, the Kozola team demonstrated animal experiments with pigs. Within 3 minutes of the nerve tourniquet stimulating the nerves of the pigs, they measured an increase in the amount of hemagglutinin in the wound, and the hemostasis time was reduced by 40% and the blood loss was reduced by 50. %. Subsequent animal experiments have also demonstrated that nerve tourniquets can effectively stop bleeding in vivo and in vitro wounds.