• Question: Is it possible to survive with a body-part missing (without any medical attention, just bandages)? For example, if you are chopping up a carrot but cut your finger of (not highly likely though), will you survive if you put bandages on it and a lot of pressure?

    Asked by anon-192243 to Sophie, Simon, Kelly on 13 Nov 2018.
    • Photo: Kelly Rushton

      Kelly Rushton answered on 13 Nov 2018:

      Well it very much depends on how bad the injury is – if you cut off your finger you might lose a lot of blood. If you applied pressure and managed to stop the bleeding you could very easily get an infection if it were left open and untreated -which could become serious enough to kill you. If you have a small injury then your blood is able to seal the wound up by clotting, and as long as it is kept clean you can mostly avoid any sort of infection.

      In the first world war lots of soldiers died from infected wounds when they lost limbs – its not a very nice way to go. The moral of the story is – if you do cut your finger off by accident – put it in some ice and take it with you to the hospital quickly – you could have it re-attached!

    • Photo: Sophie Morse

      Sophie Morse answered on 13 Nov 2018:

      Yes! Most people survive if they have a limb chopped off. You need to make sure if doesn’t continuously bleed and needs attention quite quickly. In the old days they used to chop legs and arms off if they were infected. Nowadays there are better medicines to avoid this most times but if it’s necessary then bioengineers can make prosthetic legs and arms to make life easier.

    • Photo: anon

      anon answered on 14 Nov 2018:

      Yes. Depends on your level of skill and knowing what to do to firstly stop bleeding, and then avoid infection.

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