X-Message-Number: 2387
From: whscad1!kqb (Kevin Q Brown +1 201 386 7344)
Subject: CRYONICS techniques for hypothermic medicine

[ Disclaimer: The following is my interpretation of some recent
  news and presentations.  Medicine is not one of my areas of
  expertise, though, and I may have gotten something wrong.
  If so, corrections are solicited.  Thanks.  - KQB ]

Motorcycles and cardio-pulmonary resuscitation (CPR) are the two
main sources of transplantable organs from brain-dead people,
according to Mike Darwin at a recent 21st Century Medicine
presentation.  While it is easy to see why "donor cycles" provide
so many organs, it is not as clear why applying CPR does, too.
After all, for many years the standard instructions for emergency
medicine have recommended CPR as one of the first steps to take
to recover people who lack both respiration and a heart beat.
The reason CPR produces so many vegetables is that it delivers
only a trickle flow of blood to the brain and a trickle flow
(at normal body temperature) can be worse than none at all.

Over the past decade some cryonics-related organizations have
shown competence at recovering, without brain damage, large
mammals (dogs and baboons) that have suffered hours of ischemia
(inadequate or no blood flow) at just a few degrees above freezing.
The protocols and medications used for these experiments show promise
for reducing or eliminating brain damage in humans under similar
conditions.  Two organizations, Cryomedical Sciences and BioTime,
have already received venture capital for their proposed products and
now 21st Century Medicine is seeking funding for making products from
its expertise in hypothermic medicine, too.  The need is great.
For example, 3/4 of the people having coronary bypass suffer
lasting neural deficit.  With appropriate (pre)medication and
cooling protocols, that loss may be unnecessary.

For emergency situations, as opposed to scheduled operations,
premedication is not as likely, and the prospects for avoiding brain
damage are not as good.  Nevertheless, the Sept. 1993 issue of
People^H^H^H^H^H^H Longevity magazine reports on Page 8 that
Ronald Klatz, D.O. (American Longevity Institute) and Robert Goldman, D.O.
(Life Resuscitation Technologies, Inc.) are pursuing a combination of
medications and cooling with their Brain Resuscitation Device to help
reduce brain damage while emergency technicians attempt to restart the
heart with CPR.  Researchers at the American Red Cross are already
evaluating the effectiveness of this approach on animals.

It will be interesting to see how these efforts shape up in a few years.

				 Kevin Q. Brown
				 
				 

Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=2387