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this is either luck or survival of the most fit. Stab wounds "in the box" to the area of the chest where the heart and great vessels live is the reason to be evaluated in the trauma center. As you watched the 1/2 pint of blood escape, what would be the next move? Holding pressure works if his pectoral muscle is the offending bleeder, if it's an intercostal vessel, he'll bleed until he's hypotensive and short of breath...he would be bleeding into his chest, or he hit the heart or a MAJOR blood vessel and you would watch him turn a nice shade of purple as he dies infront of your eyes.
The moral is if someone is stabbed in the chest, they need a trauma center evaluation by a trauma surgeon who could fix the bleeding.
All of that said, he could live through all of his incarceration a develop a late complication like rupturing the injured vessel once it began to heal/remodel the vessel.
Word to the wise, all stabs are eval'ed in the trauma center and then releasaed to be incarcerated.
I bet this guy did fine...but will the next one with the same problem do as well?
T-2
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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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