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MEDICAL EXAMINER recipe feature PAGE 7

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HEALTH • MEDICINE • WELLNESS • HEALTH • MEDICINE • WELLNESS • HEALTH • MEDICINE • WELLNESS • HEALTH • MEDICINE • WELLNESS • HEALTH • MEDICINE • WELLNESS • HEALTH • MEDICINE • WELLNESS • HEALTH • MEDICINE • WELLNESS • HEALTH • MEDICINE • WELLNESS • HEALTH • MEDICINE • WELLNESS

AIKEN-AUGUSTA’S MOST SALUBRIOUS NEWSPAPER • FOUNDED IN 2006

The Fix

Imagine this scenario: you’ve just spent a few thousand dollars on new hardwood flooring in your living room. Now you’ve decided to transform your fi replace too. The bricks that match the outside of the house will go, replaced by rugged fieldstone. You should have done the fi replace fi rst, but it’s too late for that now. As one of the big

heavy hearthstones is brought into the living room, it is accidentally dropped, leaving a huge gash in your brand new hardwood floor. You’re dismayed and annoyed, but there’s nothing you can do about it now. It’s done. But a funny thing happens. Within a few days the huge gash starts to seem less and less huge. Within a week or two you can’t even tell there was every any damage to the floor at all. As unrealistic as that scenario may seem, it’s exactly what happens when our skin is injured. Within days, all traces of that nasty cut or scrape have disappeared completely. We’ve all gotten “the fi x.” We don’t even think about it. We should. It’s an amazingly complex operation.

Sooner or later we all need one

Whenever there is a break in our skin, big or small, a sophisticated repair crew is instantly on the scene. More than a trillion repair crew members — called platelets — are constantly on patrol at all times. Since each platelet has only about a 10-day lifespan, the body manufactures 200 billion new ones every day, give or take a billion or two. Platelets are the smallest of blood cells, which might seem odd for plugging holes, but that’s part of why they work so well. Whenever there’s a system breach of some kind — let’s say a diabetic pricks her finger to test her blood sugar or a kid falls off a bike and scrapes his knee (see illustration) — the injury exposes collagen. Platelets in the vicinity are drawn to collagen like kids to candy, and the contact causes the platelets to swell up and release adenosine diphosphate (ADP), a chemical that encourages platelets to clump together and change shape as needed to plug the hole. If the wound is too big for platelets to seal the deal, they’ve still done a good job of fi rst aid, helping to limit blood loss.

BODY PARTS: THE SERIES

The entire system of major wound healing is so complex and sophisticated that, if any platelets and their various colleagues happen to read this, we’re going to apologize here and now for over-simplifying the work you do. We mean no disrespect; it’s just that it would take an advanced degree in molecular biology to even begin to understand it all. The broad strokes of fi xing a bigger wound involve fibrin, which, as its name suggests, spins fibers across the wound like microscopic sutures. While this is going on, vasoconstrictors are hard at work since, as any plumber knows, it’s pretty hard to patch a leak in a pipe with water (or blood) gushing out of it. Other chemicals will interact with the completed fibrin patch, quickly transforming it from gel to solid. Once repairs have been completed — it might take days or weeks — proteins in a clot change into an enzyme called plasmin, which breaks down the now-unneeded strands of fibrin and disperses the debris into the bloodstream for disposal. A big repair job — after trauma or major surgery — can take years, erecting a matrix upon which other cells can rebuild and restore as close to the original as possible, filling in depressions caused by lost flesh, restoring blood vessels, tightening and contracting the size of the wound and more. The fi x is an amazing system. +

The CSRA’s Premier Staff “We do our best so you’ll look your best!”

706.722.4653 • 1216 Broad St. in beautiful downtown Augusta www.iuiscrubs.com • facebook.com/internationaluniformscrubs

APRIL 28, 2017

MAY 6 - 12, 2017

MEDICAL • CULINARY • INDUSTRIAL APPAREL • SCREEN PRINTING • EMBROIDERY

DID YOU

KNOW? Everyone knows that it’s illegal to text and drive. And to check Facebook and drive. And to read or post email and drive. And to tweet and drive. And to Google something and drive. That doesn’t seem to prevent many drivers from doing all of the above. The conscientious drivers, however, take comfort in the fact that they don’t do any of the above unless they’re stopped at a red light (or a stop sign). BUT DID YOU KNOW: In Georgia, “it is against the law to text, email, and use the internet on any wireless device at stop signs and stop lights.” Do not adjust your Medical Examiner; it’s true. But most of us definitely do need to adjust our driving habits. + Source: headsupgeorgia.com Governor’s Office of Highway Safety


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