DARPA's Wound Stasis Technology Could Save Lives

Battlefield medical care administered by first responders is often critical to the survival of injured servicemembers. In the case of internal abdominal injuries and resulting internal hemorrhaging, however, there is currently little that can be done to stanch bleeding before the patients reach necessary treatment facilities. The resulting blood loss often leads to death from what would otherwise be potentially survivable wounds.

A foam-based technology developed under DARPA's Wound Stasis System program has demonstrated encouraging results in testing. In test models, the foam has been shown to control hemorrhaging in a patient's intact abdominal cavity for at least one hour. During testing, application of the product reduced blood loss six-fold and increased the rate of survival at three hours post-injury to 72 percent from the eight percent observed in controls.

The foam is designed to be administered on the battlefield by a combat medic, and is easily removable by doctors during surgical intervention at an appropriate facility. In tests, removal of the foam took less than one minute following incision by a surgeon. The foam was removed by hand in a single block, with only minimal amounts remaining in the abdominal cavity, and with no significant adherence of tissue to the foam. Features appearing in relief on the extracted foam showed conformal contact with abdominal tissues and partial encapsulation of the small and large bowels, spleen, and liver.

Program performer Arsenal Medical, Inc. developed the product for DARPA, with additional funding from the Army Research Office.

[Agora]

DARPA, please never stop being awesome.
And maybe release a few more videos here and there, these are awesome.

[HeshWantsCandy]

It explained that at the end of the video. This foam is to seal an injury after it has happened. The foam is surgically removed once you get to the hospital.

[MrDnB]

"In tests, removal of the foam took less than one minute following incision by a surgeon. The foam was removed by hand in a single block, with only minimal amounts remaining in the abdominal cavity, and with no significant adherence of tissue to the foam."

[ThunderboltA]

according to DARPA's article it took a surgeon less than a minute to remove

[SecondOpinionUSA]

BRILLIANT PEOPLE who invented this: WELL DONE❣️

[roidroid]

Also, i can imagine this being used external to the body to immobilise patients with suspected spinal injuries. Just inject the foam into a lose neck collar.
It might also be used to immobilise a broken limb! Inject it straight into the leg or arm of the clothing (not into the body), so your own shirt becomes your arm brace.

[AdamCantor]

Not necessarily. Internal bleeding can occur without breaking the skin. In many cases, anastomosis can be achieved laparoscopically.

[QrayzHD]

The whole point of this is to keep people alive until they can perform surgery, obviously some of you geniuses didnt know that surgery almost always involves making holes but the difference will be that the person will survive, you learn something new everyday.

[AngrypnY]

This would be amazing for Emergency Medical Services.

[FlyersDistrict]

looks like it hurts like hell as it's expanding inside the cavity.

[headshooter]

do you honestly think you are the first person think about risks of that technology? i am pretty sure that darpa also has spend some thought to make it non-lethal.

[maxmos]

I am playing the Black Ops II. Perhaps we can introduce this to the players for abdominal wounds. A medic charachter is not applied in the game. Perhaps it should be, to apply a patch like this with holding x and waiting 5 seconds, until the patch is foamed up. Then the player can continue to play. I suggest hardcore rounds for this technology.

[planetdank]

I got here from the Darpa subscription.

[DemonicToilet]

hopefully this technology will make being a medic or corpsman a whole lot easier.

[dogztalk]

how is it removed? how long can it stay inside abdomen? allergy? is it breakable? if wounded bends during transport, will it injure organs, bend, or break? to many questions... but sounds like life savior, praise the science! ;)

[ZeusTelemaxos]

I want to see a real live test of Injury, mixing, injecting and removal.

[adolfosaavedra]

Oh my gosh had totally had this idea some time ago, except it was for fragile packages

[redbird]

I foresee allergic complications. How will it affect the diaphragm?

[ThunderboltA]

according to the video it would mold around organs/ muscles it could mold around the diaphragm and not inhibit breathing (if the patient took a deep breath the diaphragm would be relaxed and the foam would mold around it and still give it enough room to expand/ contract) even so the people who would administer it would not be your basic medic, most likely more experienced medics (like PJs) who would carry O2 for the patient so either way problem solved

[roidroid]

i think as it's expanding inside the cavity it's still a liquid, and flows relatively naturally. It likely solidifies only after it's already expanded.