U.S. Military Developing Ultrasonic Tourniquet

Burlap writes to tell us the MIT Technology Review is reporting on a new DARPA venture to create an "ultrasonic tourniquet" to help stem bleeding on injuries sustained in battle. The project plans to commit $51 million over the course of 4 years. From the article: "[I]t aims to create a cuff-like device that wraps around a wounded limb. Rather than applying pressure to the wound to stem the flow of blood, the device would use focused beams of ultrasound (sound waves above the audible frequencies) to non-invasively clot vessels no matter how deep they are."

Comments

Another great new weapon

[BlackSabbath]

clots "no matter how deep they are".

I believe this could also be a weapon whose end result would be indistinguishable from death by "natural causes".

I guess its appropriate the military came up with this.

Re:Another great new weapon

[aXis100]

Massive clotting would be a pretty good sign of "unnatural causes"

Re:Another great new weapon

[dave1791]

If you are at the state where you are applying a tourniquet, saving the limb is no longer the primiary aim. You are saving the victim at the expense of the limb.

Re:Another great new weapon

[wowbagger]

As I said when this came up on Technocrat a month and a half ago -

Yes, this makes such a good weapon for combat. I have to run up to you, slather you with ultrasonic conducting gel, ram a probe against your skin, find a major artery, and then hit it with ultrasound.

And you are going to be standing there, like a dummy, holding your rifle with a stupid, slack-jawed look on your face, and let me do it.

READ THE FUCKING ARTICLE. THIS DOES NOT WORK AT A DISTANCE.

Moreover, the results of ultrasonic cautery are TRIVIALLY identifiable by any medical examiner.

Get over your "The military is doing this - they must want to use it to KILL PEOPLE." - the military also wants to save the lives of its own people, jackass. Most of modern trauma medicine - you know, all the procedures, equipment, and drugs they will use to save your sorry ass when you wrap it around a tree because your cellphone was more important than driving was - were developed by, GUESS WHAT - THE MILITARY.

Re:Another great new weapon

[ArcherB]

Shock waves are too brief to do any meaningful heating to tissue. They'll rip off your arm if anything.

At which point, you will need some sort of tourniquet. I hear they are coming out with a "Sonic Tourniquet" that may fit the bill.

Re:Another great new weapon

[andrewman327]

"I believe this could also be a weapon whose end result would be indistinguishable from death by 'natural causes'."

"Excuse me Mr. Abadulakazam, could you please lean forward?"
"Why?"
"Well sir, I want to kill."
"Oh, well in that case here you go."
"Thank you, just let me clamp this around your neck and turn it on."
"Ok."
"Whatever you do, don't remove it. It will take a while to actually kill you, so by removing it you would save your life incredibly easily."
"I'm not one to insult the American government (other than blowing it up) but this seems like a pretty bad weapon."
"Well, DoD heard good things about it from this guy who calls himself Black Sabbeth, so they decided to try it."
"Oh, I see."
"Dead yet?"

Re:Another great new weapon

[wowbagger]

Boy, reading comprehension must be optional in schools now-a-days.

Did you not read where I said, "Ultrasonic cautery is trivially identifiable by any medical examiner".

Now, since you've demonstrated that you have a problem actually READING WORDS let's see if I can help you understand how this applies.

Ahmadinejad dies on the plane. His people scream for a autopsy. The ME takes one look at his brain, and says "SHIT - somebody used an ultrasonic cautery on this man. This wasn't natural causes - THIS WAS MURDER."

Now, if you are going to say "duuuuuh - yeah, but, duuuh, they will silence the ME, duuuuh.", then I will point out that if they can silence the ME, then killing Ahmadinejad with a small amount of poison in his food, or with a quick needle stick of poison is FAR EASIER than putting shit in his seat, FAR EASIER to cover up, and equally "undetectable" as the ultrasonic cautery.

Now, stop and READ what I wrote. Then THINK IT THROUGH. I know it hurts - but the more you actually USE your brain for something other than keeping your skull from imploding, the less it will hurt.

Oh, and for the stupid among the moderators (obviously not YOU - YOU aren't stupid, it's some of those OTHER mods that are stupid) - I am being rather nasty to this cretin because that is the ONLY way this jackass will learn to actually READ what he is responding to. But go ahead - do what you think, or rather FEEL, is best - I've long ago given up on the moderation system as producing meaningful results.

Worst. Idea. EVER.

[Kuroji]

Because the first thing that's going to happen when your clot's not big enough is that it's going to go to your lung. Or heart. Or brain.

You can expect the statistics of soldiers having strokes for no apparent reason to go WAY up.

Re:Worst. Idea. EVER.

[tacarat]

Because the first thing that's going to happen when your clot's not big enough is that it's going to go to your lung. Or heart. Or brain. You can expect the statistics of soldiers having strokes for no apparent reason to go WAY up.

Sure, but the question is will the amount of strokes go up more than the amount of soldiers dying from internal bleeding goes down. Since the article makes it sound like the bleeding is stopped by using heat (hot poker?) rather than making something like sonically concocted platelette crystal thingies (which I thought of when I read the title), strokes may not be such a huge risk. Besides, given the choice of a possibly recoverable stroke or heart attack versus guaranteed bleeding to death, I think most would roll the dice.

Still, soldiers should make sure their post-mortem wills include living will instructions (and check how thier insurance covers it). All of that can be done for free with their military legal offices.

More uses?

[Centurix]

Maybe they could invest in making a device that un-clots blood using the same technique? If they could say stop a clot before a stroke kicks in somehow.

think of the uses!

[macadamia_harold]

Once applied to a wounded limb, the cuff would automatically detect and then seal damaged blood vessels or arteries, by focusing beams of ultrasonic waves at the wound to clot it, in a process known as high-intensity focused ultrasound, or HIFU.

in other news, the CIA has a large number of "enemy combatants" that have died unexpectedly from stroke...

Reversible?

[oostevo]

But how reversible is it?

Granted, my only medical experience is treating badly banged up Boy Scouts, but I can see two issues with this thing:

1) How reversible is it? I mean, once the wounded person gets to advanced medical care in a hospital or the battlefield equivalent, how easy is it to remove the clots? I know this (thryombolysis) can be quite tricky for hospitals to pull off as it is in cases like heart attacks and pulmonary embolisms.

2) What about partially formed clots? I can only imagine the damage caused by huge amounts of partially formed clots floating around in the body wreaking havoc.

Granted, if the person would clearly die without the treatment anyway, then those points are void. But surely this has more side effects than tying a piece of cloth around a limb and cinching really tightly.

At any rate, those seem like some pretty clever engineers and scientists at work, and I certainly hope this device works as well as they hope it does.

In related news...

[tacarat]

"An individual from the local Army research center was hospitalized this afternoon. Doctors are puzzled by a mysterious disease that caused his penis to massively swell, then fall off. Witnesses in the emergency room said they heard muttering and sobbing 'I only had it on quarter power!'. It is currently believed that the condition is not contagious".

Think "wounds, sustained in battle"

[tomatensaft]

Well, I guess, this device is meant for very special situations, when there is already an emergency -- think "wounds, sustained in battle" -- these aren't only 5.56 bullet wounds, but also severed arms, legs, inner bleeding etc. From what I remember from first aid classes I received during basic training (in an defence organisation, similar to the American Maryland National Guard), if you've got your leg severed, you don't really care if that clot is going anywhere at all... You've got literally seconds to stop the bleeding, because you lose hundreds of grams of blood every second (that is a liter in less than a minute). And if the question is life or death, it doesn't matter, that you have to risk the life of the injured to at least try to save his life.