Hockey player neck injury

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wholeheartedly

wholeheartedly

Epi Geek
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This was a really tragic accident. I’m wondering if there’s much you could do in this situation to save a players life on the ice?

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After death of player Adam Johnson, how dangerous is ice hockey?

The death of Adam Johnson on the ice sheds light on the risks of the fast-paced sport.
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Happened twice in Buffalo. Clint Malarchuk, Sabres goalie, in 1989, got his carotid and part of jugular slashed by a skate. He lived. In 2008, Richard Zednik, playing for the Florida Panthers, had his common carotid slashed by a fellow player in a scrum. He lived.

Goalies now wear neck guards. Other players don't.
 
This happened in a European league. Wonder what staff they have out there?

Can you put a finger or something in the hole of carotid or jugular? I know nothing about this. Seems like a blockage to one of those would be just as bad as bleed out?

Paging vascular. @LucidSplash anything that could be done to keep some like this from bleeding out before they get to a hospital?
 
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wholeheartedly said:
This happened in a European league. Wonder what staff they have out there?

Can you put a finger or something in the hole of carotid or jugular? I know nothing about this. Seems like a blockage to one of those would be just as bad as bleed out?

Paging vascular. @LucidSplash anything that could be done to keep some like this from bleeding out before they get to a hospital?
Click to expand...
Direct pressure. The blood flow is 40% each carotid, and 10% each vertebral, so, plug one, there's still ~60% blood flow to the brain, so, you won't kill the person.
 
Mount Asclepius said:
A very sad incident.

Vascular surgery would be more helpful than ENT.

Even then I would imagine not a ton you can do quickly on the ice when you sever a carotid.

Neck guards probably the better answer.
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When Zednik got cut, he was taken to the local vascular center, about 5 minutes from the Arena, and his carotid was still attached by a thin bridge of tissue, so, the sx just grabbed the lower part with some forceps and repaired it. It didn't completely sever and regress into the thorax, so, they didn't have to go hunting. The vascular surgeon, whose name I forget, but recall is an Indian woman, said his life wasn't in danger. And, Zednik played again!
 
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I watched the video multiple times zoomed in, and as someone with experience playing hockey, it’s my opinion that the raising of that skate was not accidental. Every player watching from those benches knows what happened.

Immediate and unrelenting direct pressure over the carotid and IJ, followed up by prompt surgical repair might have saved his life. By the time he got to anyone with the skills to recognize this, it was too late.
 
Birdstrike said:
I watched the video multiple times zoomed in, and as someone with experience playing hockey, it’s my opinion that the raising of that skate was not accidental. Every player watching from those benches knows what happened.

Immediate and unrelenting direct pressure over the carotid and IJ, followed up by prompt surgical repair might have saved his life. By the time he got to anyone with the skills to recognize this, it was too late.
Click to expand...
Where are you seeing this vid? The way you describe it is lurid. You are stating one player killed the other.

And who didn't know to put direct pressure on it? That's basic, Basic EMT stuff. Like, prudent layman.
 
Apollyon said:
And who didn't know to put direct pressure on it? That's basic, Basic EMT stuff. Like, prudent layman.
Click to expand...
Is your experience that EMS generally knows how to control aggressive bleeding? It sure as hell isn't around me. Invariably I will get someone who comes in looking like a freaking mummy but is still bleeding. Once you take down the absurd amount of extraneous dressings and simply apply a small single bandage under appropriate pressure, the bleeding stops.
 
wholeheartedly said:
This happened in a European league. Wonder what staff they have out there?

Can you put a finger or something in the hole of carotid or jugular? I know nothing about this. Seems like a blockage to one of those would be just as bad as bleed out?

Paging vascular. @LucidSplash anything that could be done to keep some like this from bleeding out before they get to a hospital?
Click to expand...
Chance of massive stroke probably better than definite death.
Finger in hole. Stop bleeding.
 
Apollyon said:
Where are you seeing this vid? The way you describe it is lurid. You are stating one player killed the other.

And who didn't know to put direct pressure on it? That's basic, Basic EMT stuff. Like, prudent layman.
Click to expand...
I saw it on Reddit somewhere. It seems like the player that cut him might have lost balance after hitting another player and thrown his leg up to balance himself. It was a pretty wild swing of his leg, however, and could see how someone might think that while he didn’t have an intent to kill, he might have had some less than innocent intent (like tripping).
 
BoardingDoc said:
Is your experience that EMS generally knows how to control aggressive bleeding? It sure as hell isn't around me. Invariably I will get someone who comes in looking like a freaking mummy but is still bleeding. Once you take down the absurd amount of extraneous dressings and simply apply a small single bandage under appropriate pressure, the bleeding stops.
Click to expand...
I don't know what state you're in. I was EMS in NY, and from the get-go, bleeding control was emphasized. It's a station on the practical exam. When I got to residency in NC, I see your point.

What really galled me, though, was basic EMTs in SC that brought in a woman that was already blind in the left eye, who had fallen, and the corner of the dresser caught her right eye, tearing open the right sclera. What did the basics do? Put a pressure dressing on THAT! That one nearly drove me bonkers!
 
thegenius said:
What can you do? I would hold pressure, and maintain pressure, and just hope a vascular surgeon can repair the injury. What else can you do?
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Having been playing for 20+years, it's one of those things that's shocking when it happens and also shocking that it doesn't happen more often. As mentioned above, most goalies wear a neck guard +/- a dangler. Haven't seen video on this, Zednik's was a guy that got knocked head over heels and his blade came up like a backswing. Not sure how much a neck protector would interfere with a player's mobility, doubt it would get mandated in the NHL.
 
Apollyon said:
That's what they said about helmets, face shields, gloves, and face masks for goalies.
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Yeah but they haven't mandated cages for NHL skaters and those would save significantly more serious injuries than neck guards for skaters.
 
Apollyon said:
Where are you seeing this vid? The way you describe it is lurid. You are stating one player killed the other.

And who didn't know to put direct pressure on it? That's basic, Basic EMT stuff. Like, prudent layman.
Click to expand...
Article with video embedded linked below.

Warning: It’s not for the faint of heart. Based on the amount of blood lost in the first 5 seconds, I don’t think anyone could have done anything for him.

ZeroHedge

ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero
www.zerohedge.com www.zerohedge.com
 
Arcan57 said:
Yeah but they haven't mandated cages for NHL skaters and those would save significantly more serious injuries than neck guards for skaters.
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Stepwise. Don Cherry said a lot of stuff, but, one thing was that the European players wore face shields more than North American players. It sounded like chauvinism, and insulting the European trained, it turned out to be true. That was around 2005 or so. In 2013, the face mask became mandatory, with players playing at that time being grandfathered (like Zdeno Chara). It was like Craig MacTavish being able to go without a helmet until he retired in 1997. The NHL mandated helmets in 1979, and Mac started just before that came down.
 
oldtown said:
Article with video embedded linked below.

Warning: It’s not for the faint of heart. Based on the amount of blood lost in the first 5 seconds, I don’t think anyone could have done anything for him.

ZeroHedge

ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero
www.zerohedge.com www.zerohedge.com
Click to expand...
That's not a standard hockey play, FWIW. I doubt he meant to kill the guy but that collision could happen 10,000 more times and not result in him striking another player with his skate blade.
 
Apollyon said:
Happened twice in Buffalo. Clint Malarchuk, Sabres goalie, in 1989, got his carotid and part of jugular slashed by a skate. He lived. In 2008, Richard Zednik, playing for the Florida Panthers, had his common carotid slashed by a fellow player in a scrum. He lived.

Goalies now wear neck guards. Other players don't.
Click to expand...
I remember seeing this. Scary as ****.
 
That reminds me, I was talking with one of my wife's cousins, who plays in an amateur league. They require the cage. He told me, a skate was right in the middle. The cage saved him. Without it, it would have cut him in the midline, like Two-Face.
 
Zebra Hunter said:
I saw it on Reddit somewhere. It seems like the player that cut him might have lost balance after hitting another player and thrown his leg up to balance himself. It was a pretty wild swing of his leg, however, and could see how someone might think that while he didn’t have an intent to kill, he might have had some less than innocent intent (like tripping).
Click to expand...
Looks like the guy who cut Johnson was arrested for manslaughter.
 
I haven’t watched the video but didn’t some ppl say it looked like the other player deliberately kicked at the guy?

I doubt he meant to kill him, but this is another country so maybe this is like analogous to a negligent homicide type thing?
 
Well England is a country where you can go to jail for freedom of speech/thought crimes or misgendering someone. So this does not surprise me at all that they would find manslaughter in this incident.
 
ScepticSkeksis said:
Well England is a country where you can go to jail for freedom of speech/thought crimes or misgendering someone. So this does not surprise me at all that they would find manslaughter in this incident.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I used to be a fan.
These days, seems the French understand more about freedom.
 
RustedFox said:
Yeah, I used to be a fan.
These days, seems the French understand more about freedom.
Click to expand...
Maybe they will find another Montesquieu, and then we will find another Jefferson, Franklin, and Washington....
 
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