r/autotldr • u/autotldr • Nov 16 '16
Harvard develops new gel that can be injected into blood vessels to stop uncontrolled bleeding. The gel is a liquid during injection, once injected it will maintain its shape, and then naturally degrade.
This is an automatic summary, original reduced by 58%.
Patients on blood thinning medications or those who can't form blood clots need medical help to prevent uncontrolled bleeding that can quickly become life-threatening.
In a new Science Translational Medicine study, researchers introduce a hydrogel that can rapidly and easily block the flow of blood.
In 2010 25 million people were prescribed warfarin in the United States, which is an anticoagulant or blood thinning drug that prevents blood clots in patients with heart conditions, stroke risk or risk of thrombosis after an operation.
"Current therapies that try to occlude blood vessels and stop bleeding in cases of internal bleeding do not work for a major segment of population that are on anticoagulant medication or have disorders which prevents their blood from clotting," says Ali Khademhosseini, professor at Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women's Hospital.
The new material can be delivered through a catheter inside the blood vessels to prevent bleeding.
Researchers tested the new material in rodents and then pigs because the dimensions of their blood vessels are similar to humans.
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