Yeah verily, on Fri, 15 Feb 2008 18:48:07 GMT, Wayne Throop did exercise
fingers and typed:
>: "Sheerluck" <sheerluckholmes@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
>: how about doing CPR during an emergency in space?
>: Apparently , they have already thought of that and have a
velcro-restraint
>: system for just that purpose . The catch is the patient could be dead
in the
>: five minutes it takes to get them into the harness .
>
>Huh. I would have thought a simple ball with two tethers would work
>better. Just put the ball over the chest, get behind the victim and
>pull on the tethers. Lacking that, just make sure there's at least
>one passageway of appropriate diameter (or that can be shimmed
>down to the appropriate diameter) to brace both parties.
>
>Perhaps I'm merely misunderstanding the "pulmonary" part.
>But that'd be forced air to the mouth, right? So we're just
>talking about the "cardio" part, right?
There's a much easier way.
There's serious research being carried out right now in overhauling the
CPR
process, based on two realities: first, chest compression really isn't
that
effective. In order to compress the chest enough to move blood, you're
almost guaranteed to damage the ribs. Second, people don't really to do
mouth to mouth due to communicable disease.
The second is the easiest problem to solve: over time, CPR has reduced the
amount of mouth-to-mouth required. Originally it was 1 breath for every 5
compression, then 10, then 15, now it's two breaths, 30 compressions, and
repeat. In most cases of CPR, oxygen isn't the problem, it's moving the
blood. There's been success in using compression-only as compression
itself causes air to move in and out of the lungs. The next overhaul of
the CPR standard is in 2010 (I think) and there's a move to do away with
the artificial respiration part entirely except in cases (like drowning,
choking or exposure to low-oxygen atmosphere) where the lack of oxygen is
itself the reason for the arrest. In most other cases like heart attacks,
stroke, accidents or whatever, only compression would be used.
On to the compression: there's also a movement to do away with the chest
compression in favour of abdominal compression. First, it's easier to
compress because you don't have to be as specific in your hand placement
as
you do with the chest. Second, about 25% of the body's blood is in there
at any one time, which so you get more blood movement than compressing the
chest. Third, because it's soft tissue there's less chance of causing
damage than compressing the more rigid ribcage. Fourth, because it's
easier to compress and there's so much of a blood reservoir, you don't
need
as much force, which again makes it easier (and further reduces the risk
of
more injury). Fifth, the pressure naturally moves the diaphragm, which
causes more air movement than trying to squeeze the ribs.
Naturally it couldn't be used in all cases--abdominal injuries, a pregnant
woman, say--but then current CPR has issues as well when you have existing
broken ribs or severe facial injuries, so that's pretty much a wash.
If this goes through (and I think that it will, at some point), CPR in
zero-G would pretty much be using a slightly modified Heimlich maneuver.
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