This procedure could prevent millions of deaths each year caused by things such as heart attacks or choking.
Scientists have designed microparticles which, when injected directly into the bloodstream, quickly oxygenate your body enabling you to live even if you can’t breathe. The microparticle, developed by a team at Boston Children’s Hospital, will allow medical teams to keep patients alive and well for 15 to 30 minutes despite major respiratory failure.
The particles are composed of oxygen gas pocketed in a layer of lipids about two to four micrometers in size and carries “three to four times the oxygen content of our own red blood cells.” It has been successfully tested on animals under critical lung failure, restoring oxygen in their blood to near-normal levels, granting them precious additional minutes of life.
This breakthrough, though obviously in its early stages, has the potential to revolutionize medicine. Imagine being able to sustain life in between heart transplants indefinitely or to have an ambulance arrive on scene to find a person unconscious and not breathing, giving them a life saving injection to keep their body alive without drawing breath.
Science is rocking my socks of late. Keep it up you incredible, nameless researchers from around the globe.
