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about 4 years ago I was approached by one of the companies making this thing....how would I like to puncture sternums with it was the question, the answer was why? There are so many available veins in the human body, even patients that are in class 3 or 4 shock {spend a day with me or Doc-T and we'll show you how to access veins you have never seen, touched,i.e., deep basilic in the upper arm, Internal jugular, femoral all with a 5cm angiocath}....I can even pour NSS down an ETT if needed.
The original argument for these souped up ear piercers was the typical medic may not have the equipment, skill to find adequate venous access and in a true emergency, could use the intraosseous route. The studies showed a few harpoonings of the heart, a bicortical puncture (went through inner and outer parts of bone, thereby resuscitation the mediastinum (area around the heart)) and now that we actively practice hypotensive resuscitations, what is the real role for these instruments of potential disaster????????
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'Revel in action, translate perceptions into instant judgements, and these into actions that are irrevocable, monumentous and dreadful - all this with lightning speed, in conditions of great stress and in an environment of high tension:what is expected of "us" is the impossible, yet we deliver just that.
(adapted from: Sherwin B. Nuland, MD, surgeon and author: The Wisdom of the Body, 1997 )
Education is the anti-ignorance we all need to better treat our patients. ss, 2008.
The blade is so sharp that the incision is perfect. They don't realize they've been cut until they're out of the fight: A Surgeon Warrior. I use a knife to defend life and to save it. ss (aka traumadoc)
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