A promising new approach to saving stroke and cardiac arrest victims is also being investigated as a technique to improve laparoscopic surgery. Researchers at Argonne National Laboratory and the University of Chicago have developed a specially engineered ice slurry that cools organs, allowing doctors more time to treat patients.
The core idea is to rapidly cool the blood of targeted organs with a highly fluid mixture of small, smooth ice particles suspended in saline solution. For sudden stroke or heart attack, rapid blood cooling could delay the death of heart and brain cells, giving doctors and paramedics more time to revive victims.
Ice slurry technology could also give surgeons more time to perform minimally invasive laparoscopic surgery, which frequently requires temporarily stopping blood flow to small organs, such as kidneys or the liver. Cooling these organs before stopping their blood supply would give surgeons more time to operate before organ cells began to die from lack of oxygen.
No comments:
Post a Comment